


Mother Of Money

by Survivor4Life



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Buried Alive, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Gen, Hostage Situations, It Gets Worse Before It Gets Better, Kidnapping, Non-Consensual Drug Use, Protective Hyungs, Ransom, Useless Police, Zhong Chen Le-centric
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-10
Updated: 2021-03-07
Packaged: 2021-03-07 18:01:52
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 20
Words: 60,364
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26931820
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Survivor4Life/pseuds/Survivor4Life
Summary: “Are you seriously refusing to pay the ransom? They're going to kill him - actually fucking kill him - and you're refusing to pay the ransom?""That is correct."
Relationships: Qian Kun & Zhong Chen Le, Zhong Chen Le/Everyone
Comments: 167
Kudos: 501





	1. Money? Death?

**Author's Note:**

> I'm back! More angst :)

Chenle adored hiatus. He adored performing, too, but hiatus would always have a special place in his heart. It was a time when he was just allowed to be a human being instead of a pixelated icon on a television screen.

If he went too long without releasing some kind of content then he would start to get withdrawal from the support and the interaction and adoration that came with every V-Live, every concert, etcetera, etcetera, but when he had just a couple of weeks to himself, he felt like he could finally breathe.

The company was seriously hectic right now. SuperM had just come out with an album, the almighty Kim Jongdae was finally emerging from the shadows and, of course, NCT 2020 was on the horizon.

Needless to say, Chenle felt ever so slightly neglected.

Dream hadn’t performed properly in months. In just over a week’s time, they would be filming a music video – with Mark – but it felt like forever since they’d last had something new to practise at the studio. Every rehearsal had felt old and boring.

SM clearly had an issue with balancing out roles. 127 had twice as many comebacks as Dream and WayV barely had any. Taeyong and Mark were worked to the point of exhaustion that was so severe they ended up hospitalised for days at a time and yet members like Chenle were discarded.

There were twenty-one of them – well, twenty-three now. It wouldn’t be difficult to spread the attention evenly amongst them all. Give their leader a much-needed rest. Give their newbies a chance to settle into the life. Give their less-promoted members an opportunity to do something more than an occasional five-minute reality broadcast.

Chenle huffed out a breath and closed his eyes, permitting his head to loll sideways until his temple was pressed against the cool glass of the taxi window.

He had seven days before he was due back in Korea for the music video filming. Seven days in which to prepare himself for probably the most chaotic few weeks of his life. Seven days to store as many restful hours as possible before he was stretched so thin he might snap like a rubber band.

Putting twenty-one children in a room with only Taeyong and Kun to supervise and telling them to act like grown adults had never been a good idea.

Did that mean Chenle would be one of the more mature and responsible ones? Fuck, no. But, still, he worried about what SM’s plans were. They had so many artists and many more waiting in the wings for an opportunity to debut.

Did they really have enough resources to offer each and every one of them a chance in the spotlight?

“So, are you visiting someone?” the taxi driver chirped from the front of the vehicle, and Chenle forced his eyes back open.

“Yeah,” he mumbled sleepily, shuffling a little more upright in his seat. “I’ve got some friends I’m staying with for a couple of days.”

He hadn’t seen the WayV members in months. Kun, Sicheng, Xuxi, Ten. He’d talked with Yangyang, Dejun and Kunhang over video call but he couldn’t remember the last time he’d spoken with them in person.

With NCT 2020 due to debut in just over six weeks, it wouldn’t be long until he was thrust into the same space as them, but with so many people it would be difficult to actually get to properly catch up with one another.

That was why he was using his last week of freedom to kill two birds with one stone: visit his home country and meet up with his fellow natives.

“Forgive me if I’m wrong,” the driver continued. “But aren't you one of those idol singers from Korea?”

Chenle arched an eyebrow. The guy looked to be in his early to mid-fifties and yet he recognised a boyband who’d debuted four years ago? It seemed unlikely but then again, he wasn’t one to judge somebody on their music taste.

The driver seemed to realise what he was thinking because he scoffed in embarrassment and hurried to explain himself.

“My daughter’s a fan.”

Chenle nodded, making a soft O shape with his mouth to show that he understood.

“Although I’m thankful she is or else I wouldn’t get to go to nearly as many concerts as I do.”

He chuckled and Chenle felt inclined to join in. It was nice to meet an older fan, even if he was too ashamed to call himself a fan. The reputation that K-Pop supporters received was far too discriminatory in the singer’s opinion.

People should be allowed to enjoy whatever kind of entertainment they wanted without fear of judgement or ridicule.

“Here we are,” the driver alerted him as the taxi slowed to a stop outside WayV’s dormitory.

Chenle mumbled his thanks, digging his credit card out of his pocket and entering his PIN number into the machine. Just as he was about to climb out of the car, however, the driver spoke up yet again.

“Be careful.”

Chenle froze, glancing over at the man with his eyebrows drawn together in confusion. It seemed an odd thing to say to a complete stranger who was just trying to meet up with his friends.

He waited for some kind of elaboration or an explanation as to why he should be careful but the driver was no longer looking at him, choosing instead to stare resolutely out through the windshield at the road ahead.

Barely suppressing a shiver, Chenle almost tripped in his haste to get out of the vehicle. Something just didn’t feel right and it had the hairs on the back of his neck standing erect and to attention.

Nothing sinister happened, though. The taxi screeched off as soon as he’d closed the door. Through the window, he caught the briefest glimpse of the driver lifting a phone to his ear but then both he and his car were gone.

Surely it meant nothing. Maybe it was a dodgy neighbourhood. Although why the company would put WayV in a dodgy neighbourhood was beyond him. Maybe he was just a sweet old man who wanted to ensure the safety of his passenger. That was it.

That had to be it.

But still, Chenle couldn’t shake the feeling that maybe he shouldn’t have asked to be driven straight to the dormitory. What if he’d just given his members’ address to somebody who really shouldn’t have it?

All of a sudden, it was too dark and too quiet and too isolated for him to be standing alone in the street. Even the lamps overhead didn’t seem nearly bright enough to illuminate the cracks in the pavement.

Clutching his bag close to his chest, Chenle jogged up the garden pathway and hammered – maybe a little too heavily – on the door. He turned around as he waited for a reply, staring out across the road.

Why did he feel this way? He shouldn’t be. It was just one mildly creepy taxi driver. It wasn’t like somebody had held a gun to his head or threatened him in any way. No one was standing at their window, glaring at him from the safety of their own home.

So why was he suddenly convinced that somebody – _somewhere_ – was watching him?

The door opened and he whipped around a little too quickly for a person who wasn’t supposed to be scared, but Kun didn’t seem to notice.

“There you are,” he snorted at the sight of Chenle shivering slightly on the welcome mat. “I was starting to wonder if you’d been mugged or something.”

Chenle deflated. Of course, he was being ridiculous. Paranoid. Delusional. Even Kun – the world’s most serious human being – was joking about the possibility that anything would happen to him on his way here. Surely that was a sign that he was being stupid.

“Sorry,” he puffed out, a little breathless as he stepped over the threshold.

Kun was already taking his bag from him and encouraging him to remove his coat, acting like the motherly host he’d always been. Chenle hadn’t realised just how much he’d missed that while they’d been separated.

“How was your flight? Anyone recognise you at the airport?”

“No one. I got through just fine.”

Another upside of being on hiatus: fans stopped scouring the airport for any signs of an artist on their way to a schedule. All he had to do was slip on a hat and a mask, make sure his hair was dyed black, and he wouldn’t be noticed.

“I hear my dude!” somebody yelled from the kitchen.

Less than two seconds later, Chenle was pounced on by the human embodiment of a golden retriever puppy.

“It’s my dude!” Xuxi shrieked in his ear, wrapping both tree-branch arms around Chenle’s waist and lifting his feet from the floor so he could shake him like a teddy bear. “My little dude is here!”

“Ge,” Chenle wheezed through a laugh. “I can’t breathe.”

Xuxi set him back down, albeit reluctantly, and took the opportunity to give the younger boy’s cheeks an apparently-much-needed squish.

“He’s so cute! Look, Kun-ge! He’s so cute!”

“Stop torturing the poor kid!” Kun called over his shoulder as he made his way down the hallway. “He’s only just got here and now you’re going to make him want to leave again!”

Unnerving taxi experience completely forgotten, Chenle allowed himself to be scooted into the living room where Sicheng, Dejun and Kunhang were spread out over the sofas, engrossed in whatever was on their phone screens.

Kun barked at them to say ‘hello’ and that was the first time they seemed to realise they even had a guest. Sicheng got up for a hug and Chenle grasped both of the other two’s hands in greeting just before Ten and Yangyang appeared from upstairs.

The rapid flow of Mandarin felt so unbelievably organic. Back in Korea, Chenle could only converse in his mother tongue when he was with Renjun but here, everybody spoke his language.

His home was with Dream, always and forever, but this right here … this was home, too.

“Renjun-ge would’ve come, too,” he explained in response to Sicheng’s wide disappointed puppy eyes. “But he has a radio show to host and apparently that makes him too good for the rest of us.”

Ten snorted derisively, “Brat.”

“Don’t you have a thing, too?” Kunhang pointed out. “On the YouTube page with Jisung?”

“Oh, yeah!” Chenle cried with as much sarcasm as he could toss into his tone. “Renjun-ge gets to interview real celebrities and make them fall in love with him while I play dominoes with a flipping teenager who doesn’t have a sliver of respect for the social hierarchy at play in this establishment.”

“Jisung still isn’t calling you ‘hyung’?”

“Not even once!”

He loved that kid. He loved him with every bone in his body but God … His sole purpose for existing seemed to be to annoy the hell out of every one of his hyungs. The fact that he was taller than almost all of them seemed to have filled him with misplaced confidence.

“Speaking of,” Sicheng quipped. “How are the new kids dealing with the run-up to comeback?”

“That’s the thing!” Chenle squawked indignantly, flopping down on the couch beside Xuxi and exaggerating a sigh of pained exasperation. “We get two new members and I think ‘finally! I won’t have to be the baby anymore!’ and they’re both older than me!”

He looked around at all of them, expecting some kind of collective cheer of agreement, but all he saw were raised eyebrows and amused expressions.

“But how are they doing?” Sicheng reiterated after a beat of silence.

Chenle huffed, sticking his lips out in a pout, “They’re adorable and perfect in every way. The fans are going to love them.”

It was all just for fun. They enjoyed teasing each other, testing the boundaries and giggling at one another’s expense. Jisung knew he pushed Chenle’s buttons. He did it deliberately. And Sungchan and Shotaro were good friends of his. Just the other day, they’d gotten a meal together and teased Shotaro on his mispronunciation of the Korean word for ‘pork chop’.

“Well, as much as I’d love to sit here and listen to you complain about how difficult your life is,” Kun joked, moving behind the sofa so he could rest both hands on Chenle’s shoulders and lean down to kiss him on the top of the head. “Someone’s got to make the food and I don’t see any of you volunteering.”

“Why would we?” Yangyang cut in, blinking innocently from his place sitting cross-legged on the carpet. Looking as if butter wouldn’t melt. “You’re the only one who’s actually boring enough to learn to cook.”

There was a collective smattering of laughter just seconds before everybody ducked to avoid the cushion that Kun threw at Yangyang’s head.

“Just for that, you can take out the trash.”

“What?” Yangyang whined indignantly. “But it’s Xuxi-ge’s turn.”

“Don’t look at me.” Xuxi dived over the back of the sofa and darted towards the kitchen to escape his responsibilities. “You did this to yourself, little brother!”

Yangyang seemed to have realised he’d shot himself in the foot and let out a groan of protest, toppling over onto his back and thrashing around like a toddler having a tantrum.

Nobody paid him the slightest bit of attention and Chenle found it hilarious to watch everyone act as if this was simply a daily occurrence in the household.

“The bags are by the backdoor anyway,” Sicheng chipped in, once again having returned to whatever game was on his phone. “All you have to do is dump them outside.”

Finally taking pity on a groaning Yangyang, Chenle pushed himself up from the couch and heaved the kid to his feet. It was a lot more difficult than it should have been considering Yangyang seemed to have decided that he no longer wanted to use his legs.

“Come on,” Chenle laughed, tugging on the kid’s hands to try and get him to move. “I’ll do it with you. Come on!”

At long last, Yangyang gave in. He led Chenle through the kitchen, throwing some of the filthiest looks he could muster at Kun and Xuxi as he went, and up to the backdoor. The flimsy plastic black bulges were sitting on the mat beside the untidy rows of mismatched shoes, tops already tied in knots.

Chenle stuffed his feet into a pair of Ten’s trainers since they seemed most likely to fit, slung one of the bags over his shoulder and followed Yangyang out into the garden.

“They bully me,” the boy was grumbling. “They’re a bunch of bullies.”

“I seem to remember you calling Kun-ge boring,” Chenle pointed out as they made their way down the side passage towards the street at the front of the house. “So, I’m not sure you can claim victim rights in this scenario.”

They reached the sidewalk and deposited the trash bags on the concrete, making sure they were perfectly visible for when the garbage truck came round the following morning.

A few doors down the street, a van that appeared to have been previously sitting stationary hummed to life. Its engine sputtered and the headlights flickered on, blinding the two pedestrians with bright white light.

“What the fuck …?” Yangyang muttered as both he and Chenle lifted their arms to shield their eyes.

Chenle was about to suggest that they go back inside but before he could get his tongue to shape the syllables, the van suddenly lurched forwards without any warning at all. It must have gone from zero to forty almost immediately because it reached the spot where they stood in less than three seconds.

Chenle instinctively stumbled backwards, half of his mind convinced that the lunatic was trying to run them over, and he felt Yangyang’s hand clamp around his wrist.

The van halted right in front of them and alarm bells started blaring in Chenle’s head.

“Go …” he choked, unsure whether he was talking to himself or to Yangyang, but whoever it was didn’t listen because neither of them moved.

Shock. It was supposed to save your life when you were in danger but right now it was the very thing that was preventing them from escaping the danger that lay straight ahead of them.

The vehicle hadn’t even properly stopped before the side door was being yanked aside and two faceless figures dressed all in black leapt out onto the pavement. 

Only then did Chenle realise he had to run, but it was already too late.

Everything happened so fast. Movements were blurred, sounds were distorted, faces swam and voices shrieked and bodies were jerked this way and that and the whole thing was over in a fraction of a second and yet it changed Chenle’s life forever.

He tried to turn back towards the house, his legs already shifting themselves into a run, Yangyang still clutching his arm, but those black figures were upon him before more than a single step could be taken.

“Let me go!” he screamed, desperately trying to shake them off.

It was useless. They were huge. He wasn’t.

Yangyang was shouting, too, but Chenle couldn’t see where he’d gone. He could only hope that his friend wasn’t being hurt by any more of these men as the two who were holding him dragged him, kicking and flailing, back towards the van as if he were no heavier than a sack of flour.

He had one on either side of him, gloved fingers digging into his upper arms so tightly that he could already envision the hand-shaped bruising that would appear there tomorrow morning.

He tried to kick one but the angle wasn’t right. He tried to bite, scratch, punch but they were too strong. He screamed as loudly as he possibly could, demanded they release him, cried for his members just a few feet away but they moved too quickly.

His shin collided with the lip of the van’s door and as he continued to be heaved forwards, he had no choice but to cooperate or else he would probably break both his legs.

He stepped into the van, the door was slid shut and suddenly it was very, very dark. And not just the kind of dark where he couldn’t see. The kind of dark were ice started to spread through his gut and crawl through every nerve of his body.

The kind of dark that let him know life as he knew it was over.

Flung into the corner, he felt the vehicle skidding down the street at illegal speeds and curled himself into a ball on the floor so that he wouldn’t be knocked over by the force of each screeching turn and twist in the road.

There were three men in the back of the van with him, all of them in the same colourless get-up with their faces concealed by balaclavas. Only their eyes and their mouths were visible to him through the homemade slits they’d fashioned into the fabric.

Chenle pulled his knees to his chest and hugged them close as his heart started to speed up at the realisation of what was happening. Only now that his fight or flight instincts were kicking in was he unable to actually use them.

They were travelling too fast. Even if he could make it to the door and get it open, he would be killed the moment he struck the tarmac.

These three guys were a lot bigger, a lot stronger and probably a great deal more experienced in the act of hand-to-hand combat than he was. They could take him down in the blink of an eye and there was nothing he could do about it.

What if they had guns? Or Tasers? Or a syringe filled with an unknown drug that put him to sleep and left him at the mercy of the unknown?

He couldn’t breathe. He wanted to close his eyes but he didn’t want to look away from them in case they tried to do something. He wanted to bury his face in his knees, burst into tears, beg for his life, but he doubted it would work.

“What …” His voice was like sandpaper. They were all staring at him with those beady eyes poking out from beneath the masks that hid the rest of their faces from view. “What do you want from me?”

Money? He could get that. Probably. Death? If they were going to kill him, why didn’t they do it out there on the street?

And what did they do to Yangyang?

The guy closest to him moved and Chenle shrank backwards against the wall, terrified that he’d just antagonised them into growing violent. He caught a glimpse of a piece of loose black fabric before it was thrown over his head and everything got even darker.

Then it didn’t matter if he closed his eyes. It didn’t matter if he cried. So he did both. And not once did he try to remove the article of clothing they’d assigned to him because something told him that if he did, he would suffer the consequences.

**00dys 00hrs 00min 01sec**


	2. Could've Done More

The two of them were outside for maybe five minutes. No more. That was all it took. Five minutes for the world to be flipped upside down and one of them to be snatched and the rest of them to be tossed into an alternate dimension.

Because that’s what it felt like when Sicheng heard the screams from the driveway.

The only words that he actually caught were ‘Let me go’, spouted in Chenle’s high-pitched tone. The sounds that came from Yangyang were indecipherable as syllables. They were more like shapeless screams of protest.

And then silence.

The racket couldn’t have gone on for longer than ten seconds. It was like the world was momentarily interrupted by a television advert that was too loud and too sudden, and then somebody managed to change the channel.

Sicheng sat up, propping his elbows on the sofa cushions beneath him so he could catch Dejun’s eye from across the room and see just as much confusion and concern mirrored back at him.

A segment of his mind wanted to believe that Yangyang and Chenle had just been messing around, teasing each other, playing games or trying to get back at their members for sending them out with the trash bags.

But there was no way anybody could fake that much fear in their voice. It was genuine. It was real. It was undeniably and irrevocably not a prank, no matter how badly Sicheng wished it would be.

He was the first to his feet, crossing the space between him and the front door in as few strides as possible while still trying to remain as composed and as calm as somebody could be when they’d just heard their little brothers screaming thirty seconds ago.

“Hey, did you guys hear something?” Kunhang called from the kitchen.

Nobody answered him. It wasn’t until much later that Sicheng’s memories even registered the fact that he’d spoken.

Maybe some part of him knew what he was going to see when he reached out to open that door. Maybe some part of him had predicted the act of terror that had taken place in his front yard. Maybe some part of him was already prepared.

The rest of him wasn’t, though.

Feeling Dejun’s presence behind him, he pulled open the door and stepped out into the freezing cold blast of late-night air. Their street had always been a little creepy in the dark but now it was a nightmare in and of itself.

It was too quiet. Far, far too quiet.

“Chenle?” Dejun shouted, manoeuvring himself past Sicheng and approaching the road. “Yangyang? If this is you guys’ idea of a prank then you’d better –”

Sicheng saw the moment he stopped, frozen solid in his tracks. His entire body seemed to go rigid and even if Sicheng couldn’t see his face anymore, he could read the queues in his posture and in the way his hands immediately started to shake.

“Hey, what’s going on?” somebody, probably Ten, piped, their voice growing louder as they made their way down the corridor towards the source of the commotion.

Sicheng didn’t wait until they reached him.

Dread was pooling in the pit of his stomach and his mind was repeating the same meaningless mantra in an endless loop, trying to convince himself that what he thought he was going to see wasn’t actually what he would see.

He ploughed down the driveway and caught sight of a pair of legs twisted on the pavement. Dejun was positioned in a way that made it impossible to see the face that belonged to that pair of legs but it didn’t take long for Sicheng to step around him.

“Yangyang …”

The word fell from his mouth without conscience thought. His knees gave way and his hands reached for the boy’s body even though he couldn’t remember giving his muscles the command to do so.

Yangyang was lying on his side, one hand crushed uncomfortably beneath him and the other curled into a trembling fist that rested on the pavement just a few inches in front of his face.

His eyes were wide open and glassy, his entire figure was quivering like a leaf blowing in the wind and the way he was hyperventilating was a clear indication of one hell of a panic attack.

“Yangyang …”

Sicheng put a hand on his shoulder and he flinched so violently that it made Sicheng jump, too. He withdrew the unwanted touch and looked helplessly up at Dejun who was still yet to move a muscle.

He didn’t know what was going on. Yangyang didn’t look hurt but there was something seriously wrong with the way he was just lying there, gasping in terror and wheezing like he’d run a thousand miles being chased by a ghost.

And Chenle … Where the hell was Chenle?

There were footsteps approaching. Small stones beneath shoe soles. It made Sicheng aware for the first time that he didn’t have any protection on his feet at all. His toes were already numb from the cold.

“What the fuck is … Yangyang?”

Ten dropped to a crouch, in front of the victim instead of behind him like Sicheng was. That was probably the reason Yangyang didn’t immediately wither away when the older boy tried to touch him. Since he could see him, he knew he wasn’t a threat.

“Yangyang, get up,” Ten murmured, brows furrowed in bewildered concern as he hooked a hand beneath the youngest’s neck and heaved him up off the ground. “What happened? Look at me. What happened?”

He kept one arm around Yangyang’s shoulders, helping him sit upright when he probably would’ve keeled over if left to his own devices. Sicheng’s eyes naturally scanned the kid up and down, searching for injuries, but there were none.

The arm that had been pinned between his body and the ground was scratched and a couple of bloody beads were forming over a cut on his elbow but other than that, there wasn’t any evidence that would explain what was wrong with him.

Yangyang’s gaze snapped from left to right. His muscles locked with fear and he twisted to look at the stretch of road behind him. He wriggled out of Ten’s grasp and raised himself onto his knees, looking as if he was getting ready to run.

“Yangyang!” Ten shouted, and only then did Yangyang seem to realise they were there.

A tear dribbled down his cheek as he looked Ten dead in the eyes and whispered the words, “They had a gun.”

Goosebumps sprang up over every spare inch of Sicheng’s skin, the hairs on the back of his neck rose to stand straight and his body instinctively shivered, as though he was trying to shake off the feeling of eeriness.

What did that mean? Who had a gun? Where was Chenle? Did the people who had guns take Chenle? Where did they take him? Why would they take him? Why would they leave Yangyang behind?

Why would they leave Yangyang alive?

Dejun was the first one to finally come to his senses. The paralytic that seemed to have been administered when he saw Yangyang’s body had worn off and now he was at the kid’s side, taking his arm and hauling him to his feet.

“We have to get inside,” he ordered in a tone that appeared void of all and any emotion.

Yangyang stumbled. His legs looked like they were made of jelly, unable to take his weight. The only reason he didn’t faceplant straight into the ground was because Dejun was quick enough to grab him around the waist.

“Now!” he barked, and they all clamoured to obey.

Ten took Yangyang’s other side, helping Dejun to transport the still violently shivering and nonsense-mumbling boy back towards the house. Sicheng straightened up and felt his entire world tilt.

Somebody with a gun had been on their property. Yangyang wasn’t physically hurt but he was terrified. In shock. Chenle had screamed. Chenle wasn’t here anymore. Somebody with a gun had made Chenle scream and now neither of them was here anymore.

What did that mean? Did someone try to mug them? Why would a mugger target two kids who were just taking out the trash? Was it some kind of sasaeng attack? If so, why hadn’t Yangyang been injured? If this person had a gun, why didn’t they hear a single shot?

Where the fuck was Chenle?

“Sicheng!” came the gasp behind him just before a pair of hands were gripping his shoulders unnecessarily tight.

He jumped, twisting his neck to identify his assailant, and saw Kunhang’s eyes bulging with fear. Why wasn’t Sicheng feeling like that? Why wasn’t Sicheng feeling anything at all? Surely, he should be feeling something. Anything.

“Come on,” Kunhang begged, grabbing hold of Sicheng’s wrist and tugging him back towards the house. “Come on! Please! We can’t stay out here!”

Because there was somebody with a gun still in their vicinity. Maybe watching them right now, waiting for the opportune moment to strike. But if that was so, what was taking them so long? And why snatch Chenle in the meantime?

It didn’t make sense. None of it made sense. Were they coming back? Did they get what they wanted by taking Chenle or had their target been something else? Or someone else? Who hadn’t been outside yet? Kun? Xuxi? Was it one of them? Was that who they were waiting for?

“Sicheng, please!”

It was the crack in Kunhang’s voice that finally brought Sicheng back to his senses. His friend was petrified, tears slipping over his skin as he continued to yank on his member’s arm with a kind of frenzied desperation.

He was right. They couldn’t stay out here.

Sicheng allowed himself to be manhandled over the doorstep. His skin felt weird, going from freezing cold to room temperature in under a second. The mat was bristly and uncomfortable beneath his feet.

What was wrong with him?

Kunhang slammed the door shut behind them and locked it, bolts and all. Dejun’s voice drifted through from the kitchen. Sicheng could hear him asking to speak to the police.

He moved aimlessly, like his legs just had a mind of their own, into the living room where the others were gathered.

Xuxi was locking all the windows and closing the curtains. Yangyang was on the couch, still breathing harshly with one hand clamped against his forehead and his eyes unfocused. Kun was crouched in front of him, trying to get him to snap out of it. Ten was sitting at his side, one arm linked around his quivering shoulders.

Sicheng just stood there like a sim waiting for instructions.

“You need to tell us what happened,” Kun was saying, fingernails digging into Yangyang’s thighs as though that would return him to the land of the living. “Please, Yangyang, you have to tell us what happened.”

Kunhang bustled past Sicheng, looping around the back of the couch and draping a blanket over their maknae’s shoulders. Ten helped to secure it. Yangyang didn’t even seem to notice.

“Yangyang!” Kun snapped with uncharacteristic ferocity. “Where’s Chenle?”

The boy’s frantic breaths hitched at the unexpected force of the demand but his eyes did finally focus on the face in front of him. Ten tightened the arm around his shoulders, trying to coax and encourage him to spill the answers they were all desperate for.

“There was … There was a van …” the boy started, barely even blinking as he continued to stare at Kun. It was creepy to say the least. “It … It was waiting. It was waiting for us, ge. It was … It was waiting …”

His breathing began to pick up again and Sicheng saw Kun dig his fingertips even deeper into his thighs. Maybe it was some kind of grounding technique. Maybe it was just instinct. But it seemed to be working.

“It drove up to us and the door opened and … and … there were two – no, three – no, two – no … I don’t … I don’t remember. I don’t remember how many there were. They wore … um … black and they … they had masks and they … err … they … they grabbed Lele and …”

If Sicheng had the capacity to do so, he would probably have gasped. He heard Kunhang draw in a sharp hiss of air beside him but he himself was completely silent. He could only listen and try to piece together what he knew.

Multiple men dressed in black. A van that had been waiting for them. This hadn’t been an accident. They’d known what they were after. They’d been sitting on the street outside, just fifteen feet away, biding their time. This was a pre-meditated event.

“I was holding his wrist,” Yangyang breathed, wrapping his fingers around his own forearm to show them what he was talking about. “I was holding on and I … I didn’t let go … I … I swear, ge … I didn’t let go but … they … I tried to shout and they … erm … they … err … there was a … a gun and he … he pointed it at me and I just …”

He stopped. Just like that. Like somebody had pressed the mute button. He stopped speaking. His eyes unfocused once more. His hands fell limp in his lap. He gazed at something no one else could see as the tears started streaming down both cheeks.

“I just let go,” he whispered at last.

His words hung heavy in the air. Like a blanket so huge and so thick that there was no escaping its weight. Slowly, it began to suffocate them, but no one was even struggling. They were running out of air and they couldn't move.

“I let go of him,” Yangyang whimpered. He brought his hands up to his chest, curling in on himself, shrinking away from the harsh bite of reality. “I let go. How … How could I do that? I just … I just let go. I-I-I … I let go.”

They should be comforting him. He needed somebody to hold him close and tell him that it wasn’t his fault. That he’d done what any rational human being would do when a gun was shoved in their face.

But Kun was just staring up at him. Ten’s mouth was hanging open, ever so slightly, as though he himself was unable to process the information. Xuxi had been repeatedly peeking through the gap in the curtains, either to watch for the police or to make sure the van wasn’t coming back, but now he was motionless.

Kunhang sunk into a chair like his bones no longer possessed the strength to support him. Dejun had reappeared in the doorway, phone still clutched in his hand, but he wasn’t saying anything.

Nobody knew what there was to say.

The only sound in the room was Yangyang’s muffled sobs. He tried to smother them with his hands, the blanket, anything he could find, but there was no escaping the gut-wrenching sound of a boy who was realising he could have done more.

Sicheng’s mind was wrought with thoughts and theories. It buzzed with ideas, speculations about what was happening, who would do this, why they would want to and how they could’ve pulled it off.

It seemed too sophisticated to be the work of a sasaeng. They couldn’t rule it out but those freaks were usually just teenage girls with hot glue and maybe some small stones they felt like throwing.

Which meant what? Some kind of gang? The fucking mafia? Sicheng didn’t know what species of human did this sort of thing. Why Chenle? Why when he’d only just arrived in China? If it was for a ransom then surely they could have just snatched one of WayV as they were leaving for a morning schedule.

Why leave Yangyang behind? Why leave Yangyang alive? Those were the questions that kept resurfacing. If these people were as professional as they seemed to be, surely they wouldn’t want to leave any witnesses who could possibly identify them.

Although, with the state Yangyang was in, he wouldn’t be identifying anyone anytime soon.

Only one story made sense: somebody had wanted Chenle. They’d waited until he was in China, away from the company and the bodyguards and most of the people who were assigned to his protection. They’d known where he was. They’d probably tracked him from the airport.

They didn’t want to kill him or else they would have shot him outside in the road. It was entirely possible that they didn’t want to hurt anyone at all since Yangyang was unharmed. Maybe that was a good thing. Maybe that meant they would give him back so long as they got what they wanted.

Yangyang was still sobbing.

In the distance, the first few wails of a police siren pierced the evening silence.

Kun got to his feet, his face a slab of emotionless concrete, and walked calmly out of the room. They heard him slowly ascending the stairs, as if every step caused him the greatest effort, and then his bedroom door slammed shut.

And still, nobody moved.

If Sicheng wasn’t steadily dying inside, his heart would’ve hurt for Kun. Chenle was his world. There were times when he’d wondered if they were secretly brothers who’d been separated at birth. They were closer than close. In some ways, Chenle was like Kun’s child.

And somebody had just abducted him right off their doorstep. 

**00dys 00hrs 12min 19sec**


	3. Calmness And False Hope

It was beginning to dawn on Chenle that all of this was actually happening. That it wasn’t just a harmless prank for a hidden camera or someone he knew trying to mess with him.

The longer he sat there, squashed as far backwards into the wall of the van as humanly possible, the higher his anxiety began to rise. He’d been crying for at least half an hour but those were tears of numbness. Now they were tears of fear.

Why was this happening? Why him? Was Yangyang okay? Did the others know by now that he was gone? Had they already called the police? Was someone looking for him? How long would it take until he was rescued? Should he try to escape or just wait for help to arrive?

With the bag over his head and his world consisting of only darkness, he had no concept of time. It felt like they’d been driving for hours but maybe it had only been a couple of minutes.

Whoever was sitting in the back of the van with him was completely silent. Occasionally he could hear them shuffling, breathing, sighing, clearing their throats or clicking things that he prayed weren’t guns.

Realistically, though, he knew that if you were going to abduct somebody, you were going to have to bring along some pretty serious weaponry. 

He’d initially tried to keep track of how many turns they took and time the length of the journey but that attempt had failed miserably once he realised that even if he could monitor the travel, he didn’t know the area well enough to be able to do anything about it.

It took him a shamefully long time to realise that his phone was still in his pocket but he didn’t dare reach for it. He didn’t have to see to know that he was being watched. If he tried to access the lump of metal and they noticed what he was doing, what would they do to retaliate?

Not only would he lose his opportunity to call for help but he might very well sustain some major injuries for his trouble. He wanted to believe that they were aiming to keep him alive and unharmed but that didn’t mean they wouldn’t smack him around a bit if he didn’t comply with everything they said.

He could wait. Wait until he was alone or at least able to see what he was doing before he threw caution to the winds and made an attempt at escape. He couldn’t wait too long, though. Sooner or later, one of them would think to search him and then it would be over.

He had to wait. They were going to have to take the bag off his head at some point. They couldn’t keep it on forever. And even if they didn’t, so long as they left his hands free, he could remove it himself once he was sure they were gone.

It was going to be okay. He was going to be fine. People in the movies always escaped from situations like this. The stories he’d heard on the news always had a happy ending. There were interviews with the families of kidnap victims where they gushed about how lucky they were to have their little sunshine back in their lives.

That was going to be him. He was going to be fine. Everything was going to be alright.

Chenle wouldn’t say that he fell asleep exactly. He wasn’t sure that was even possible in his current situation, but he did drift. Maybe he dissociated. Maybe it was just his mind trying to protect him from the terrifying reality of his predicament.

He didn’t return to conscious thought until the van stopped.

Immediately, every little bit of calmness and false hope he’d managed to instil in himself was gone. He’d never felt fear so real or so paralysing or so unimaginably intense.

The logical side of his mind told him that this was his chance to run. That he should rip the bag off his head as soon as he heard the doors opening, shove past whoever he needed to shove past before they could stop him and just start running.

If they were in a town, he could scream. Somebody might hear him and call the police. His captors may hurt him for it but it would be worth the risk so long as he managed to get himself noticed.

But would a group of kidnappers really take their captive to a public place? Would they be that stupid? They’d already proved they were serious about their job and knew what they were doing. They wouldn’t make such an idiotic error.

His phone was his only hope.

He heard and felt the movement that suddenly sprang to life around him. The men – at least, he assumed they were all men – were getting to their feet, preparing for whatever was about to happen and Chenle instinctively tried to curl up a little smaller.

As if he could get away with not being noticed when the entire purpose of this operation had been to abduct him.

There was the sound of the van door being slid to the side and a burst of light rays that clawed their way through the thinning fabric of the bag over his head. It was almost bright enough to cause him pain.

It couldn’t be morning already. They couldn’t have been driving for that long, could they? Surely not.

Even though he was expecting it, the hands that sudden clamped uncomfortably tight grips around his elbows made him jump. He didn’t like being manhandled and he certainly didn’t like being manhandled by people he didn’t know and couldn’t see.

“Move,” one of them growled in his ear, the first time he’d heard any of them speak.

They didn’t wait for him to respond, however, before they were dragging him upright as easily as if he were a ragdoll. With no idea where he was putting his feet, he had no choice but to trust them.

And that was terrifying.

He stumbled as he was heaved forwards, waiting for the sudden disappearance of the floor beneath him when he reached the door. If it hadn’t been for the oversized oafs on either side of him, he probably would have toppled out of the vehicle altogether but with them holding him up, his meeting with the ground was only slightly bone-jarring.

The bag was large and loose and not particularly thick. He could make out shapes and figures around him and if he looked down, he could see a couple of inches of grass and his own feet.

Ten’s shoes. He was still wearing Ten’s shoes.

He felt himself being shunted in the direction of their next destination and forced his legs to cooperate with the speed he was being forced to go at. With his captors holding his arms and his vision still obscured, he had no other option.

There were stones beneath him. He glanced down in an attempt to make out any identifying features of the ground he was being led across.

It looked like what had once been a stone path but the pebbles had long since been swallowed up by weeds and vegetation. He doubted a walkway like that would exist in any kind of suburban area.

A thought suddenly flashed across his mind.

What if they were dragging him to the edge of a cliff? Or a river? Or a bridge? What if they were going to throw him over? What if this had been their intention all along? Kidnap him, take him away from his friends and terrify the living daylights out of him just so they could kill him in a way that would make his body too difficult to find?

His throat closed in on itself. It felt like he was trying to swallow lead. His breaths stuttered, his chest clenched and his legs instinctively tried to fold underneath him.

The men on either side of him either didn’t notice or didn’t care that their victim was suffering some kind of panic attack. They forged onwards, indifferent to the fact that they were practically dragging a teenager along with them.

Chenle couldn’t breathe. He had to pick his feet up, stop his toes from scuffing against the rocks, stop Ten’s shoes from being scratched and ruined, but he couldn’t breathe.

They wouldn’t kill him, right? They wouldn’t go to all this trouble just to kill him immediately, right? They wanted him for something, right? Ransom or … or … something that required him to be alive.

They wouldn’t … They weren’t … He wasn’t going to die.

Right?

If he could actually see more than the thinly threaded fibres of the black bag and the few square inches of grass beneath him then he probably would have noticed that his vision was starting to blur.

He did notice the tears making a reappearance, though. They glided down his cheeks in waves without any consideration to how difficult they were making things. He tried to swallow them back but they wouldn’t relent.

They wanted to be rid of his body before it was hurled into thin air and sent hurtling through space until it finally connected with water or concrete.

He tripped and his knees buckled but he wasn’t even allowed to hit the ground. He scrambled to get his feet back underneath him but his captors didn’t bother waiting for him.

Their fingers were digging into the meat of his biceps, cutting off blood flow and undoubtedly leaving long thick bruises that would blossom fresh within a few hours.

They didn’t care that they were hurting him. They didn’t care that he couldn’t breathe. They didn’t care that he lived or died. Whatever their motive was for this, they would be just as happy with a corpse as they would a breathing boy. Maybe they’d be even happier.

A corpse couldn’t cry for help.

All too abruptly, the scenery changed. The light was shut away, the temperature dropped and Chenle could feel the coolness of sunless shade against his skin. The grass and stones had turned to dust and sand.

They must have been inside some kind of building, but it didn’t feel like a house or anything even remotely habitable. It was too cold. It was too unprotected. The footsteps were too echoey.

If Chenle had to guess, he would say the walls were made of stone.

Barely two minutes later, his henchmen stopped. He’d been several paces behind them, his jellified legs still refusing to cooperate with his demands, but he didn’t have time to be relieved before there was a metallic clang so loud it shook his skull.

For a second, he thought whatever had made that sound was about to hit him but then there was a screech. Like a really old door with rusted hinges battling its way into obeying its master’s commands.

Then, without warning, a hand was shoving its way down into the back pocket of his jeans. Instinctively, he tried to shy away from it but he didn’t have the strength to kick up a proper fight.

The hand snatched his phone and disappeared just as quickly as it had presented itself. Chenle knew he shouldn’t have expected any better. Of course, they would take his only source of contact with the outside world.

The fleshy cuffs vanished from his arms and he was thrown forwards, completely powerless to stop himself from crashing into the ground. He wouldn’t have been able to hold himself up anyway.

They weren’t gone. He could hear them breathing behind him, feel their shadows looming over him. So he stayed exactly where he was, lying on his stomach, blindly exploring the dirt with his fingers.

The grains were certainly fine enough to be sand. Maybe clay. Like the powdery stuff they sometimes used for tennis courts. He could smell it, too. It didn’t smell good. It smelt of dampness and lifelessness and fear.

He heard that same screechy door-hinge noise followed by the metallic clang and even in his state of pure terror, he could understand that he’d just been locked in here. Wherever ‘here’ was.

His heart was in his throat. Pulse in his ears. Stomach in his feet. Lunch from yesterday threatening to make a reappearance in his mouth.

He wanted to get up but he wasn’t sure he could. His muscles were all locked. And what if they were watching him still? What if this was a test? To see how long he would lie there like a good obedient little boy? What if they planned to kill him as soon as he tried to move?

“You can take the bag off now.”

Chenle almost gagged on his own tongue. He certainly hadn’t been expecting any of them to talk to him, let alone allow him to do something so dangerous. They’d covered his eyes to stop him from identifying them.

Did that mean they no longer cared? Did that mean they’d decided it didn’t matter what he saw or heard because he was just going to die anyway?

Despite all of that, however, Chenle’s body moved of its own accord. Agonisingly slowly, he braced his hands against the dusty ground and pushed himself to his knees. He kept his shoulders hunched and his head down, perhaps subconsciously waiting for a blow.

His hand shook as he raised it. His fingers almost didn’t possess the individual motor capabilities to close around the corner of the bag before he pulled it off his head in one swift motion.

It caught his hair, mussing his fringe and splaying it across his face. He pushed it out of the way and cautiously blinked open his eyes so he could take in his new surroundings.

He decided then and there that if he saw a pair of feet, he would immediately stop looking. If he didn’t see their faces, that gave them one less reason to kill him. But nobody was standing in front of him. 

That was why he deemed it safe enough to look around.

He’d been right. The walls were made of stone. Crumbling and ancient and eroded from decades of rainfall. The ground was dirt. Sandy-coloured dust that was already trapped beneath his fingernails and soiling the front of his shirt.

There was a bed in the corner. The frame was steel and looked like it had several screws in the wrong places, maybe put there deliberately so that whoever lay on it would have to deal with the sharp prongs digging into their spine as they tried to sleep.

It did have a blanket, though. And a pillow. They were moth-eaten and smelled bad but it was better than nothing. There was a very small coffee table beside the mattress. Again, it seemed at least twenty years old and barely sturdy enough to stand on its own. By the wall was a plastic bowl, just the right size to maybe wash your face from. 

A swirling pit of ice and fire sank deep into Chenle’s gut.

From the way his new room was set out, these people appeared to be planning to keep him here for some time.

“What’s your passcode?”

He whipped around, little clouds of dust puffing up from the speed of his movements. He’d completely forgotten that his captors were still there, and now they were trying to get into his phone.

The door to his cell was not strictly speaking a door. It was made of bars, like a prison, and the lock was huge and red with rust. A large padlock had been looped around the catch and sealed shut.

Pieces of the petrifying and bewildering puzzle were starting to fall together.

Chenle’s geography wasn’t good but he’d heard of places like this. Villages that had been abandoned well over half a century ago, left to the mercy of Mother Nature and all she had to offer. If he wasn’t mistaken, most of them existed on islands in the middle of the sea.

Donghai Bridge. 33,000m. Connecting a cluster of virtually deserted islands to the mainland. No wonder the drive here had been so long. They’d literally crossed the ocean.

No one would ever think to look for him here.

“I asked what’s the passcode!”

A hand stuck itself into view, gloved fingers curled around Chenle’s phone. The lock screen was visible through the bars. Him and Kun with their arms around each other, grinning goofily up at the camera as if their world was never going to come to an end.

It certainly had now.

“Are you deaf? Or just plain stupid?”

Chenle blinked, a fresh tear slithering over his lips at the thought of what his big brother must be feeling now that he’d been missing for an entire night.

His captors were waiting for an answer. They were hiding from him, keeping well out of his sight as if they were afraid of what he could do to them. It was almost amusing to think about. He was the one locked up and yet they were concealing themselves from him.

No matter what he did or what he said, they were going to get what they wanted. He couldn’t lie to them, he couldn’t refuse to answer. They would extract the answer from him through whatever methods they pleased and any effort to stop them would be useless.

“0101,” he choked.

The phone was retracted and a second later, there was a satisfied hum of, “good boy.”

Chenle tried not to throw up there and then. He had a feeling he knew what they were going to use his mobile for and even though it terrified him, the thought of anyone he loved having to listen to a ransom call or watch a disgusting video, part of him was silently relieved.

The sooner they contacted the company, his parents, his members, whoever, the sooner he could get out of this dungeon-thing and go back home.

They would let him go, wouldn’t they? If they got the money or whatever it was that they wanted in return for his life? They would just take it and let him go back to his friends? That was why they were hiding their faces? Because they would let him go?

The uncertainty was perhaps the worst feeling of all.

“Here.”

Something was tossed through the bars and he recoiled, his malfunctioning mind somehow managing to convince him that it was a bomb or some other equally toxic weapon, but the item that rolled across the ground towards him wasn’t set to explode.

Suddenly realising just how goddamn thirsty he was, he lunged forwards and wrapped both hands around the chilled metal container. He fumbled with the cap before finally managing to pop it off, and emptied the bottle’s entire contents down his throat.

Only when he’d lowered it did he kick himself for being stupid. He had no idea when he would next be given the chance to drink – or eat for that matter – and he’d just wasted his only supply barely five seconds after he’d been given it.

But they wouldn’t let him starve, he reminded himself. They wanted him alive. For the ransom. That was why they’d taken his phone. So they could call someone and demand the money. So that he could go home. So that he could stay alive. They wouldn’t let him starve. 

He was going to be okay. Everything was going to be okay.

Right?

**00dys 17hrs 34min 21sec**


	4. A Typical Insult

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy (slightly) belated birthday to Yuta and (slightly) early birthday to Sicheng :)

Kun crossed the room for the fifty-ninth time, and that was just since he’d started counting. He couldn’t understand how the others were able to sit still at a time like this. He needed to move, to do something, to be productive.

If he could get away with it, he would’ve sprinted out the front door, into the street and started screaming Chenle’s name from the rooftops, but he knew he wouldn’t even make it to the hallway before one of the police officers tackled him.

They should be out looking, plastering their boy’s face in every shop window and on every social media site, convincing people that this wasn’t a hoax, that there actually was a little boy out there in the hands of somebody dangerous.

And yet they were still here, almost twenty-four hours after the abduction, and they’d gotten nowhere.

“Let’s try this again,” the middle-aged officer with the kind smile and endless patience said, settling himself on the sofa opposite Yangyang and preparing himself for yet another round of questioning that they all knew would prove useless.

That kid wasn’t in the right state of mind to tell them anything. He’d been a babbling mess since the previous night, volleying between vomiting nonsense sentences at an ungodly pace and going completely silent.

How many times had they tried to get him to give them just one bit of coherent information? Too many. They’d granted him time to adjust, to process the trauma of having a gun brandished in his face, but he was still the same.

Every second he neglected to pull himself together was another that Chenle was alone, in danger and potentially closing in on death.

“What did the van look like?”

Yangyang was sitting cross-legged on the sofa cushions, a blanket draped around his shoulders and his hands frantically fidgeting in his lap. He hadn’t slept a wink, had barely stopped hyperventilating and hadn’t made eye contact even once.

The police officer said it was shock, and Kun hated himself more than he thought was possible but part of him just wished Yangyang would pull it together and get over it so they could finally get some solid leads on how to find Chenle.

“It was black,” the kid said. They’d already known that. “And it … erm … it had those doors that slide sideways to open and … erm … I’m sorry, the lights were really bright and I …”

“It’s okay,” Ten murmured from where he was perched at the maknae’s side, a thumb gently rubbing back and forth over his knee. “Just go slowly.”

Kun had always prided himself on being patient, kind, compassionate and understanding. Ten was the impulsive one, heart of gold but rarely willing to wait around for things to happen, always wanting to initiate the action himself.

Now their roles had switched.

If anybody in this room understood what it was that Kun had with Chenle, if anybody had even the faintest idea of what the two of them had been through together and what they’d become because of it, they wouldn’t be judging him for his actions.

Chenle was more to him than just a bandmate or a little brother figure. Nobody here was even remotely aware of that. That was the reason why they could manage to sit still and wait while he was getting ready to jump out of his skin and start burning buildings.

“The … The number plate …” Yangyang forced out, putting his head in his hands as if it physically pained him to concentrate so hard on what he’d seen. “The number plate … it … I think it had two 8s in a row … at the end. That’s … I didn’t get a good look.”

“That’s progress, Yangyang,” the officer encouraged, scribbling the note down in his pad. “That’s really helpful. Tell me about the people you saw. Anything you can recall could mean something.”

Kun momentarily stopped pacing. Were they actually getting somewhere? After all this time was Yangyang finally breaking that shell of self-protective amnesia he’d built up around himself? Was he starting to remember?

The officer on the couch glanced over at his partner, who seemed younger and a little more stoic, they exchanged some kind of unspoken message and the partner retreated into the hallway, raising his radio to his mouth.

They were searching for the van. Surely that was a good sign. But how many black vans existed in China? A double 8 in the license plate would narrow it down but by how much? What if Yangyang was wrong? What if they tracked the wrong vehicle and it just led them in the opposite direction? 

“Masks,” Yangyang croaked, still without looking up from the skin he was tearing off the tip of his finger. “They were all wearing masks.”

“Ordinary facemasks?”

“No … Like … Like those things in the American movies with the bank robbers.”

“Like balaclavas?”

“Yeah,” the boy nodded eagerly, and he glanced up for the first time. He appeared to be returning to his body little by little in the wake of the shock. “Like balaclavas. They were … They were black … Like beanie hats but with holes cut in them for the eyes and the mouth.”

Kun’s attention was momentarily drawn to the table by the wall. Sicheng had gone upstairs a while ago but Xuxi, Dejun and Kunhang were still clustered there, watching their youngest’s interview with thin-lipped expressions and furrowed brows.

At the mention of the balaclavas, though, Dejun had dropped his head and blown out a long breath of air. Kun understood the sentiment.

How terrifying would it be not only to be kidnapped but for the culprits to be completely faceless, too?

What kind of fear was Chenle experiencing right now?

“The one with the gun,” Yangyang continued, and now he was talking fluently. It had only taken twenty-or-so hours. “He was really tall and big. Like … not fat exactly but he had really broad shoulders. I think he was … 6’1? Maybe a little taller? He was a lot bigger than me. I …”

He petered off abruptly. Kun looked over to ascertain why and was surprised to see the maknae staring straight at him. There was an expression there, hidden deep within the eyes, that he couldn’t quite identify.

Was it regret? Guilt? Sorrow?

“I didn’t get a good look at any of the others.”

He was apologising. For not doing more, for being unable to stop them, for not protecting Chenle. He was apologising to Kun because he knew – he could somehow _sense_ – the resentment his leader felt towards him.

It was sickening and Kun couldn’t stand to be there a second longer.

The door slammed shut behind him before Kunhang could even finish calling his name and he took the stairs two at a time with his teeth grinding beneath a clenched jaw. It was all he could do not to burst into tears on the spot.

He shouldn’t resent Yangyang. That was the very last thing he should be doing. There was absolutely no way it was the kid’s fault and yet he was just so angry that anybody who could be blamed would be blamed.

Why was this happening? Why to Chenle? He was barely an adult, still a child in so many ways. If these people had wanted money or just to threaten the company then they could’ve taken any of them. Why the youngest? Why go to all the trouble just for him?

Because he was smaller? Easier to grab and manhandle? More susceptible to manipulation and intimidation and therefore less likely to fight back? Maybe. But his abductors had waited for him outside the house, followed him from the airport, chosen him specifically.

Perhaps, deep down, Kun already knew the reason why. He just wasn’t prepared to dig up the memories of the past that he’d fought so hard to suppress.

He turned onto the landing and stopped dead in his tracks at the sight of Sicheng positioned by the window at the end of the hallway, staring blankly through the glass panel without really seeing anything at all.

Kun didn’t want to have to talk to him. He needed time to sort his head out and order his emotions and only then would he be able to fall back into his role of leader. Right now, he was more likely to cause harm than help with the state his head was in.

His attempts to creep past Sicheng were foiled, however, by the boy’s bat-like hearing. Without even turning around, without the floor even creaking to alert him to his leader’s presence, he knew Kun was there.

“Taeyong just called,” he said in a tone that was flat and dead and _gone._ He’d never sounded like that before. “He told me he was trying to get hold of you but your phone was turned off.”

It was true. Kun had silenced it in order to resist the temptation to google abduction statistics and the likelihood of locating a missing person after twenty-four hours had passed.

“He said it was stupid,” Sicheng went on, still without even glancing over his shoulder. “But that he could feel something wasn’t right and he wanted to check in.”

Kun almost laughed. Almost.

It just seemed so insulting and ironic and goddamn typical that Taeyong would know something had happened before they’d even called to alert the company. Taeyong, who was hundreds of miles away in a different country, could sense the danger Chenle was in when Kun hadn’t even been able to do so from the adjacent room.

They needed to release the news. They needed to stop living in this little protective bubble where they convinced themselves that it was all a hoax and Chenle would be returned to them, safe and sound, by the end of the day.

The management needed to know. The members needed to know. And Kun knew he was going to have to be the one to break it to them because he couldn’t make any of the others suffer through the horror of having to do it themselves.

“Did you tell him?” His voice sounded like sandpaper against a cheese grater.

Sicheng shook his head, “I wouldn’t know how to.”

Well, then that was something they had in common. How were you supposed to convey that kind of news to somebody? How were you supposed to shatter their false sense of security and toss them into a world of uncertainty and terror?

_Hey, Taeyong, sorry to bother you but you know you have like a dozen kids that you’ve basically adopted as your own and you gave me about five of them to look after? You remember that? Yeah? Well, I lost one. In fact, I didn’t even lose him. I let somebody else steal him from me._

An insult. 

Sicheng had gone quiet once more and Kun was confident that he was just as unwilling to discuss the gravity of their situation as he was himself. He took the silence as a cue to leave.

His knees gave out the moment he crossed the threshold of his room and he barely made it to the bed where he collapsed onto the mattress and resisted the urge to scream into a pillow.

Time was ticking. Precious seconds were dripping away and he was sitting here doing nothing. He was sitting here still trying to process reality. Chenle didn’t have that luxury. He didn’t have time to process anything. He was being tossed from one hell to the next without being given opportunity to pause and take a breath.

If he was even still alive.

Kun booted the thought from his mind before it could properly introduce itself. He couldn’t go there. He couldn’t even approach that dark sector of his imagination.

Desperate to find something to distract him, he ripped his phone out of his pocket and powered it back up.

Just as Sicheng said, he had two missed calls from Taeyong and an unread text message:

_Hey so I know this is really stupid and I’m probably just being paranoid but since last night I’ve had this really uneasy feeling and I don’t know why. You know when you feel like someone’s watching you? Or when your gut’s telling you that something horrible is about to happen? It’s like that. I know I probably sound like a lunatic but if you could just give me a call when you get this and let me know everyone’s okay over there_

Where was Kun’s uneasy feeling when he’d needed it? Why hadn’t he experienced that same sensation? Why hadn’t he gotten the warning that something big and bad was about to go down? Why did Taeyong get it when Taeyong wasn’t the one who could’ve stopped it?

Kun tossed the phone on the bed beside him and buried his fists deep into his eyes. He hadn’t slept at all the previous night. He’d been too busy talking to the police, trying to get as much information as he could on what they would be doing to help him find his boy.

A soft rhythmic buzzing alerted him to the activity beside his thigh and he glanced down, already preparing to decline the call when he caught sight of the contact ID and the picture that was grinning up at him from the screen.

Every nerve receptor in his body was suddenly rendered useless. It was like he completely shut down to any and all states of emotion as soon as he saw Chenle’s number flashing up on the screen.

Had he escaped? Was he trying to call for help? If so, why not contact the police? They could find him quicker. They could protect him better. They would be able to track his location and take out the bad guys if they dared lay another hand on him.

It was certainly a possibility that he’d managed to get away. He was stubborn and scrawny enough to wriggle through a tiny little gap and start running until he found somewhere safe to crouch and contact his gege, but there was a far more likely scenario here.

The person on the other end of that call wasn’t Chenle, and Kun knew it.

He had to answer. He couldn’t keep them waiting. It would make them mad. It might make them violent. He might lose his one and only chance to negotiate with them or beg for the life of their hostage.

Should he run downstairs to the police? Should he yell for somebody to come up to him? Or should he stay silent and answer it himself? What if the kidnappers killed Chenle as soon as they realised the law enforcement were involved? What if that was one of terms of their ransom demand: no police?

How many times had the phone rung by now? How much longer was Kun going to sit here, gambling with a child’s life because he was too cowardly to answer the call and too stupid to make a single goddamn decision.

He had to make a decision right now.

“Hello?”

“Qian Kun?”

The voice was raspy, low and gravelly. Indisputably male and with the kind of breathing one might expect from a heavy smoker or a chronic alcoholic.

There was no other background noise that might indicate where the caller was located and there was no point checking the GPS. It would be turned off. 

“Y … Yes, that’s me.”

“I assume you know why I’m calling.”

Kun swallowed thickly, “I want to speak to him, please.”

There was a slight chuckle from the other end of the line. Not quite a full laugh but a tinker of amusement that spluttered through a pair of rugged lungs and was intended to cause maximum uneasiness.

How could somebody laugh in a situation such as this?

“I don’t think you’re in a position to be making demands, do you?”

Stupid. Stupid, stupid, stupid. He’d already said the wrong thing. This was why he should run downstairs and give the phone to that police officer. They were trained for this. They knew what not to say to set off the psycho who had their finger on the trigger.

But could he risk it? Surely if he moved now, this man would hear everything he said and did. Then Chenle might be dead.

“What …?”

He hated how tremulous his voice was, even to his own ears. He could only imagine how it appeared from the caller’s perspective. He must sound positively petrified and this bastard was probably enjoying every second of it.

“He’s not harmed. We’ll send proof in the coming days. Go to the police if you like. It makes no difference.”

They were fearless. They weren’t afraid of capture. Was their plan that fool proof? That they didn’t even need to concern themselves with something as mundane as the police force? How many times had they done this before to make them so confident?

And proof? They would send proof? What did that mean? A photo? A video? A call? Would he get to see Chenle, speak to him, make sure he was okay or as okay as somebody in his predicament could be? They said he wasn’t harmed but what reason did Kun have to trust them?

What if they decided that their ‘proof’ would be a finger in a box? Or some other kind of severed body part? They were in complete and utter control here and there was nothing Kun could do or say that would change that.

It didn’t even matter now that he was alone up here with nobody to tell him what to say or how to react because what good were the police if the culprits themselves weren’t even bothered by their existence?

It suddenly occurred to him that maybe Chenle was listening to this. Maybe he could hear the fear in his big brother’s tone but just couldn’t call out to him. And if that was so, Kun was not going to sound weak.

“What do you want?”

There was a long pause of complete and utter noiselessness. Not even a breath from the man who held Kun’s heart in the palm of his hand. He wasn’t communicating with somebody, wasn’t doing anything but enjoying the tension he was creating.

“₩200 billion.”

Kun almost choked, “I … don’t have that much money.”

Another chuckle. This one longer, darker and a great deal more sinister. The sound wouldn’t be out of place in a gangster movie where the decorated mob boss ran his fingers through a trail of blood and brought the substance to his lips for a taste.

“I’m sure that, between you, your company and the boy’s family, you’ll come up with something.”

_Click._

**00dys 19hrs 00min 27sec**


	5. Chilled And Tough

Chenle learned pretty quickly that if he closed his eyes, avoided breathing through his nose and wrapped himself up as tightly as he possibly could in the scratchy tatters of the blanket they’d given him, he could pretend he was somewhere else.

At first, he hadn’t wanted to use the bed at all. It smelled of damp and mould and he had a sneaking suspicion that if he lifted up the lumpy mattress, he would find a colony of something disgusting growing underneath.

So, he curled up in the corner of the cell, wedged as far backwards into the wall as his body would allow him. He drew his knees up to his chest, wrapped his jacket around himself and tried to pretend he couldn’t hear the soft mumblings of his captors outside.

Maybe it was an act of defiance, his refusal to utilise the comforts they’d provided him with, but it was more likely to be an act of fear. He didn’t want to think about what would happen if he fell asleep on that bed and somebody happened to come in.

Just the thought of it made him shudder and he had to bury his nose in the crook of his elbow, searching for warmth and comfort that he wasn’t going to find anywhere else in this ancient prison cell.

He planned to stay there all night, just waiting until the first rays of sunlight shone through the tiny window at the top of the wall, but then the temperature dropped further than he could have imagined and he was left with no choice.

Shrugging off his jacket, he used it as an insulator so that the blanket itself could stand as a layer of protection between him and the family of whatever creepy crawly nightmare that lived underneath.

He had to tuck his knees right up to his nose in order to fit himself beneath his jacket and even then, his feet and his back were mostly exposed to the shockingly icy air that suddenly began trickling through every crack in the brick mortar.

If he thought for a second about the kind of bacteria that would be festering all around him, he knew he would throw up, burst into tears or suddenly start pounding on the bars and begging for release. Maybe all three.

That was why he taught himself to pretend.

Pretend that he was back in the dorm but that the heating had gone off during winter. Pretend that he was sharing a bed with Jaemin but the older boy had hogged the entire blanket. Pretend that he wasn’t here. Pretend that he was anywhere else.

The first night was supposed to always be the worst but the most terrifying thing about it was that he didn’t know how many were going to follow. How long were they planning to keep him here? Days? Weeks? Months?

Had they already used his phone to contact whoever was going to be tasked with paying the ransom? How much had the price been set at? Was it affordable? Would anyone even pay?

Chilled.

Chilled to the very bone.

Would anyone even pay?

If he hadn’t been coming down from a monstrous adrenaline high, a flood of tears, a couple of panic attacks and over thirty-six hours of absolutely no proper rest, he never would’ve fallen asleep.

It was only because his body was desperately pleading for a recharge that he managed to float away into a wondrous world of painlessness and safety and warmth. He had no idea how many hours he managed to grab before that world was ended.

At the screech of the door being opened, he bolted up into a sitting position, his jacket slithering off his body and onto the floor. He would have reached for it but he was too intent on scrambling backwards until he was perched on the pillow with his spine to the wall.

The man in the balaclava smirked at him. Even though his face was covered, it was still obvious that he smirked. It wasn’t a cold sneer or a predatory snarl. It was more of an exasperated huff of amusement. Like he’d been betting on his prisoner reacting that way.

Adamant on not letting the guy out of his sight, Chenle resisted the urge to rub the sleep from his eyes and kept himself firmly curled up, as tiny a target as possible.

The plate was metal and so the loud clang it made as it was placed on the table reverberated off the stone walls. The sun bounced off its curved edge at just the right angle to hit Chenle in the face, almost as if it was taunting him.

_It’s a beautiful day and you’re locked up in here._

He brought up a hand to shield his eyes and that was when he saw what was on that plate.

Rice. And noodles. Actual rice and noodles. As in, not a mirage or a figment of his imagination. Real food. Edible food. Food for him to … But was it for him? Or was it a trick? Was it poisoned?

Idiot. Why would they go to all the trouble of bringing him here if they were just going to poison him? They had guns. Poison was too much effort to go to. If he was going to die, it was going to be with a bullet in his skull, not a toxin in his meal.

The man in the balaclava pulled up a three-legged stool on the other side of the table and sat down, interlocking his gloved fingers in front of him and resting his elbows on his knees.

Chenle stared at him, then at the food, then back at him.

There was no way he was going to touch a morsel on that plate unless he was given express permission to do so, but god, did it smell good. When was the last time he’d eaten? Not since he’d arrived at the dorm. Maybe not even since he’d got on the plane.

On cue, his stomach gave a loud protesting rumble that wouldn’t be silenced even when he placed a warning hand on top of it. His captor huffed once more before finally agreeing to put the poor boy out of his misery.

“Go on,” he said in that gruff voice Chenle remembered from his first day. This was the guy who’d taken his phone. “It’s for you.”

Chenle needed no further telling. He scooted forwards until he could swing his legs over the edge of the bed and place his feet on the floor. He felt a little less protected in this position but what did that matter when there was actual food in front of him and he was actually allowed to eat it?

No cutlery. He couldn’t afford to be choosy.

The noodles were dry and undercooked and the rice was plain and tasteless but it didn’t matter. He shovelled it down, handful after handful, barely even stopping to breathe. At one point, he almost choked but managed to get his lungs under control again.

His water bottle – why was he starting to think of these things as _his_? – was set down on his left and he grabbed for it, swallowing ravenously.

It didn’t occur to him until a lot later but that bottle was supposed to have been in his cell with him the entire time and the fact that it had suddenly been magically refilled suggested somebody had been in while he was asleep.

“You’re hungry,” his captor observed once the plate had been licked clean and the bottle was once again bone dry. “My apologies we didn’t feed you sooner.”

Chenle peered up at him through his fringe, using his sleeve to wipe the excess food and water from his mouth and chin. Kidnappers weren’t supposed to apologise for something as mundane as forgetting to feed their victim.

Kidnappers weren’t supposed to apologise for anything.

“We got in contact with your gege.”

Chenle felt like his heart momentarily stopped beating and he had to remind himself that lungs were there for a reason.

Which gege? Who had they called? What had they said? What had their demands been? Had they told one of his members or a company representative that he was hurt? Dead? That they were going to chop him up into little pieces if they didn’t comply?

“He understands the terms of this arrangement,” the man continued, as calmly as if he were discussing a business transaction and not a person’s life. “Now we just need to provide him with proof of life.”

The last of the food had already slithered its way down Chenle’s gullet but he still swallowed. He’d been afraid of this proof. He’d known it was going to have to be collected as soon as they took his phone with the intentions of making a ransom demand but that didn’t mean he’d managed to prepare himself.

Instinctively, he brought his legs back up onto the bed with him and folded his arms around his knees.

The man reached into his pocket and Chenle tensed, expecting a knife or a gun or some other unimaginable instrument of torture, but the only thing that he saw was a small chunk of paper and a pen.

Both were set down on the table, the plate and bottle transferred to the ground where they were out of the way, and Chenle stared at these new tools with nothing but bewilderment.

“You’re going to write a letter.”

A letter? That was it? That’s all he had to do? Just write a letter? Not have his finger cut off or his face punched or his body beaten while somebody stood in the corner and filmed it all for evidence?

He just had to write a letter?

Still slightly uneasy, convinced that this was a ruse, he unfurled himself once more and picked up the pen. There were maybe four or five sheets of paper, folded in half so they could fit in their carrier’s pocket.

He separated one from the rest, smoothed it out over the table and looked up expectantly.

“Who …” His voice sounded terrible. He hadn’t used it in hours and it wasn’t happy about it. “Who am I writing to?”

“How about the SBS Broadcasting Station in Korea?”

Chenle’s entire body locked and his hand immediately started to shake, the nib of the pen trembling just a few millimetres above the paper. He didn’t raise his eyes but he could feel his every movement being scrutinised and observed.

Were these people not afraid of capture? Were they so confident in their ability to get away with this that they were willingly exposing their own crime to an entire country? Surely that would just spur the police into making a quicker arrest.

And people would know. Not just people, but everyone. The whole world. If the broadcasting station released the letter – of course, they would, they were a fucking _broadcasting station_ – then news would travel like wildfire.

Everyone would know. Everyone would be watching.

But wasn’t that a good thing?

Maybe he was missing some element of their plan that made this all fit together like perfectly-shaped pieces of a jigsaw puzzle and prevented them from ever feeling the cool metallic sensation of handcuffs around their wrists.

But maybe he wasn’t. Maybe they were just being too cocky. Maybe they were being stupid. Maybe they were shooting themselves in the foot and making it a hundred times easier for him to be rescued.

“What do I write?” he forced out of his clogged throat, already scribbling down the station’s address at the top of the page.

There was another huff, that same huff, and he sensed the man in front of him crossing one leg over the other. Making himself comfortable. He really was completely at home in this scenario.

“Tell them who you are.”

_My name is Zhong Chenle. I’m an idol singer under SM Entertainment and a member of the group NCT._

“Tell them you’ve been abducted.”

_I was kidnapped from my company dormitory in Beijing on the evening of October 10 th. _

He thought back to that night. It seemed so long ago but it couldn’t have been much more than a day since a van had screeched up in front of him and his universe had been flipped upside down.

His stomach gave a sudden pang as he thought of Yangyang whose fate was still unknown to him, but he pushed it down and shoved it away. So long as he got through this, he would either be rescued or the ransom would be paid and he could go home.

“Tell them you’re unharmed and we treat you well.”

_They give me food and water and I’m not hurt but I’m scared. I want to come home._

“But tell them that, if we don’t receive our payment of ₩200 billion, we will cut off your finger and send it to your groupmates.”

If it was possible for a human being to combust, Chenle would have combusted right there and then. It was a wonder he managed not to cry out in shock and terror and hurl the pen at the face on the other side of the coffee table.

Forget the finger, 200 billion? _Billion?_ That was more money than he would be able to earn in two lifetimes. Was the company even in possession of a sum like that? And if they were, would they be willing to pay it? For somebody as insignificant as him?

If it was Mark, sure, they would pay. If it was Taeyong, absolutely. Taemin or Baekhyun, bring it on, but him? Easily replaceable, melts into the background, could probably pass for a backup dancer him? Never.

These brutes had chosen the wrong person.

No one was going to pay that much money. No one in their right mind. So, did that mean he was going to lose a finger? Because of something he couldn’t even control? Because they’d set the bar far too high?

“Why aren’t you writing?”

“Sorry …” he croaked, forcing his violently trembling hand to guide the pen to the paper.

 _They want_ _₩_ _200 billion and if they don’t get it, they say they’ll cut off my finger._

His eyes were filling with tears, blurring his vision to the point where he could barely see what he was scrawling but he didn’t dare reach up to wipe them away. He didn’t want this man to know how truly terrified he was.

His act was unveiled when one of those tears fell unbidden from his eyelashes and splashed onto the page, seeping through the fibres and blending the ink together.

He tensed, wondering if he was about to be reprimanded for ruining the note, but no such punishment came. His captor was probably pleased that he’d shed a tear for the sake of his freedom. It would just make the whole thing look even more legitimate.

“Tell them they have until the end of the week and that whatever they decide should be announced on live TV in a press conference.”

_You have until the end of the week to decide. Hold a live press conference to reveal whether you will pay the ransom or not._

It sounded ludicrous that they were being so public but Chenle was telling himself that it was all a good thing. That the more people knew, the more people would be looking for him and therefore the more likely he was to be found before he could lose a finger.

“And tell them that you love your mother.”

What?

Chenle’s head shot up and, for the first time since his abduction, he met his kidnapper’s eye. The shock was so paralysing, so all-encompassing, that he didn’t even feel the fear or the urge to drop his head and hunch his shoulders in submission.

Why … How … Did they know? They must do. Why else would they want him to put that in his own ransom note? Was this the real reason behind the whole affair? Was this what they were after? Was this why they’d chosen him?

“What …” He coughed weakly in an attempt to stop his voice cracking. “What does my mother have to do with this?”

The man still had his legs crossed and his posture relaxed but there was an edge of steeliness when he responded that hadn’t been present when he’d first unlocked the door.

“Aren’t you going to write it?”

He didn’t want to. It wasn’t true. He didn’t love his mother and there was a perfectly good reason for that, but these guys already knew. That was why they wanted him to put it down.

But he wasn’t exactly in a position to be arguing right now.

Gritting his teeth and clenching his fist maybe a little too forcefully around the shaft of the pen, he etched the symbols into the paper and hoped that, if his mother did indeed see this, she would know he didn’t mean a single word.

_I love my mother._

“Good boy,” came the grunt of praise as the man got up from his stool and retrieved the empty plate from the floor. “Now sign your name.”

Chenle obliged and no sooner had the last flick been scribed was the page snatched out from beneath him, folded in half and returned to its owner’s pocket.

He should be relieved that it was over and that this guy seemed to finally be leaving now that he had what he’d come for, but he wasn’t. He was angry. Angry and confused and hurt and lonely and scared.

There were still a few sheets of blank paper on the table and the pen hadn’t left his grip but his jailer was leaving. He was already halfway out the door, reaching behind him to pull the barred barrier shut and click the padlock in place.

“Wait …”

Chenle wasn’t sure where the bravery came from but suddenly he was on his feet. He didn’t advance. He definitely didn’t want to give these guys a reason to shoot him, but he wanted them to know that he was shrugging off the fear that had, until now, kept him mute and motionless.

Those eyes turned back towards him. Inquisitive. Not cruel, just … inquisitive.

“Is that what this is about?” Chenle asked, furiously thrumming a couple of stray tears from their journey down his cheek. “My mother? Did she screw you over, too? Is that why you’re doing this? Because you think you can get back at her by taking me?”

There was no response. Just blank emotionlessness. With a touch of curiosity.

“Because I’ve got news for you,” Chenle continued, and now any trace of terror was gone. He was just mad. Really, really, really mad. “She doesn’t give a fuck about me. I haven’t seen or heard from her in years. I am worthless to her so if you’re trying to hurt her the way that she hurt you, I’m worthless to you, too. And if you’re trying to get her to go bankrupt, there is no chance in hell that she would pay even a penny for me. You’re wasting your time.”

He didn’t realise until he’d finished his miniature tirade that he may very well have just signed his own death warrant. Why the hell was he admitting his uselessness to the people who held his life in their hands?

Now that they knew he wasn’t the right tool to use in their operation, surely they would just get rid of him. He should be taking back every word he’d just said, begging for it to be forgotten so that he could live another day.

But he didn’t want to.

Because everything he’d said was true.

The man in the doorway smirked. Again. Was his face incapable of doing anything else? And just as Chenle believed he was about to be locked back in here for another thirty-six hours without a decent meal to curb his hunger, the smirking man said something.

“I like you. You’re tough.”

He pulled the door closed behind him and Chenle watched, hot tears of fury still gliding over his nose, as the padlock was sealed yet again. The man paused, still holding the plate, seemingly pondering to himself for a moment.

“You can call me Xiaofei.”

And then he was gone.

**01dys 08hrs 30min 23sec**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Feedback means the world to me. Stay safe everybody :)


	6. Hatred or Admiration

“Fucking hell …”

Taeyong threw himself backwards in his desk chair, allowed his head to slump against the padded leather and spun around several times with his hands over his face and his eyes screwed shut.

No matter what he did to distract himself, he couldn’t shift this feeling of dread that had been settled in the pit of his stomach for days now.

He’d tried visiting the gym, going for a run, eating more than was allowed for an SM artist, drawing on his wall and even agreeing to join Mark and Donghyuck for a video game marathon, but nothing worked.

It was still there and it wasn’t going away.

Letting his hands drop into his lap, he glared at the computer screen in front of him. For maybe two or three hours, he’d been trying to construct a bassline for his latest song but he still had nothing to show for his efforts.

He couldn’t remember ever feeling like this before. He’d had tingles, instincts and weird sensations pricking at the back of his neck, usually when something terrible was about to happen, but never anything to this extent.

Never anything this paralysing.

He’d even dreamed about it last night. He couldn’t quite remember what had appeared inside his head but he’d awoken soaked in his own sweat and positively dying of a dry mouth.

The previous day, he’d texted virtually every member he didn’t live with, just to be sure they were all okay because why the fuck not when his psyche was so intent on depriving him of sleep?

Most of them hadn’t replied, which was to be expected. They were idols after all, preparing for the biggest comeback the industry had ever seen. Of course, they were going to be busy. But it had done nothing for Taeyong’s confidence. 

Maybe that was it. The comeback. Maybe he was just stressed and terrified of messing it all up when he was essentially at the forefront of the entire operation. Maybe it was nothing that he needed to be worried about.

“Hyung!”

His soul almost left his body and he flinched so violently that his knee collided with the underside of the table. Pain ricocheted down his shin and he grunted in irritation, rubbing the traumatised spot as he spun his chair around.

He didn’t even have time to ask Doyoung why the hell he was barging into his room with so much urgency and scaring the life out of him before a phone was thrust in his face.

“Read it.”

Eyes still watering slightly from the pain, he glanced up at his friend with every intention of refusing his order due to sheer pettiness alone, but then he saw the look on the guy’s face.

Terror.

Bewildered and suddenly apprehensive, Taeyong took the phone and lowered his gaze to the article on the screen.

The only thing he read before his innards gave a sickening lurch and he was unable to continue functioning as a normal being were the words, _NCT DREAM’S CHENLE ALLEGEDLY BEING HELD FOR RANSOM – SM YET TO RESPOND._

This was it. This was what his gut had been trying to tell him.

He felt like he was going to be sick.

Doyoung seemed to realise his leader had lost all sense of self-composure because he snatched the phone back and started scrolling through the article as if he hadn’t read it over and over a thousand times. Taeyong could only stare at the place where the screen had been.

“It’s circulating everywhere,” Doyoung was saying somewhere above him. “Twitter’s blowing up, people are freaking out. They say a letter was delivered to SBS’ Broadcasting Station in Chenle’s handwriting, demanding ₩200 billion in return for his release.”

Taeyong very slowly leaned forwards in his chair until his elbows could rest on his knees and he could put his head in his hands.

Any hope he’d had of this being one twisted hoax was gone. A news station couldn’t report on a fake story. They couldn’t report on any story without first checking the basic facts or they risked a lawsuit.

That meant there was something there. Some element of truth in the words they’d typed into a document and posted online. There was a letter demanding ₩200 billion. The only question was whether or not Chenle had been the one to write it.

“I’ve tried calling Kun-hyung,” Doyoung continued, as if Taeyong wasn’t combusting on the spot. “And Ten and Sicheng but none of them are picking up. Manager-nim said he was going to the company to sort it out but I haven’t heard anything back from him. I don’t know what to think, hyung.”

Neither did Taeyong.

He was still processing and he didn’t think he was ever going to stop. How did somebody begin to accept the fact that one of the kids in their care had somehow been abducted?

He tried to remind himself that he couldn’t believe anything until he saw the proof for himself but it was hard to stay calm when he’d known for days that something big and bad was about to go down.

“Shit,” Doyoung cursed under his breath. “Jeno’s calling me.”

Taeyong could only sit there.

“Jeno, I’m telling you, I don’t know.”

Red and black swirls were starting to dance in front of his closed eyelids but he couldn’t bring himself to raise his head.

“No, I can’t get hold of them either.”

He was barely even keeping track of how frequently he was breathing.

“No. N – Jeno, no! Do not leave the dorm and don’t let Jisung out of your sight. Just … all of you stay where you are. I’ll call you back as soon as I know something.”

Where were they supposed to get ₩200 billion?

The door slammed and only then did Taeyong look up. He hadn’t even realised that Doyoung had left the room. Now there was just him and the soft mechanical whirring of his computer.

It was like he was frozen in time while the rest of the world moved at double the speed.

He swiped his phone off the desk, trying to ignore the numbness that seemed to have encompassed his fingers. He’d put the device on silent so he could focus on his work but now that it was back on, the messages were reeling in faster than he could read.

56 missed calls. 211 unread texts.

How was this happening?

He opened up his messages in the hope that he would find something of use. It took a good three minutes to scroll through all the terrified questions from various members and the caps-lock screams from worried friends before he finally landed on a single line sent from Ten’s number just under an hour ago.

_We’re on our way_

What did that even mean? Was that confirmation? Was that the proof Taeyong needed to believe this was all real? Ten was supposed to be busy in China so why would he be flying back to Korea if the rumours were baseless?

The phone began to vibrate in his hand, his manager’s contact ID flashing up on the screen, and Taeyong couldn’t answer the goddamn call fast enough in his desperation to get some fucking answers.

“Hyung?”

“Taeyong …” The man sounded breathless. Like he was running. That couldn’t be a good sign. “I’m assuming you’ve seen the news.”

“Yes, what’s going on?”

“It’s true, Taeyong. I’m sorry.”

No.

No.

Just … no.

“There was a letter,” his manager continued to pant from the other end of the line. “I haven’t seen it but I was told it does resemble Chenle’s handwriting. I’ve just got off the phone with the management team in Beijing and they confirmed it, too.”

Words … What were words and how did he use them? What was breathing? What was even living right now? How was he supposed to do any of those things anymore? What was the point and where was the instruction manual? How should he be reacting to this?

“Chenle was abducted from the WayV dormitory two nights ago. The police are already aware but Kun got the ransom call yesterday. Apparently, Lee Soo Man will be holding a press conference in a few minutes’ time.”

There was so much information there and Taeyong’s mind was already struggling to keep up with the bombshell Doyoung had dropped on him five minutes ago.

Two nights. Two whole nights and nobody had bothered to tell them. But then again, he reminded himself, they’d probably been too caught up in police questioning and just plain fear to be able to pick up the phone.

And Kun … Kun got the call? Did he speak to Chenle? Did he hear his voice? Confirm he was alive? If not, how did they even know he wasn’t dead already? They could’ve killed him as soon as he wrote that note or just simply forged it themselves.

“Taeyong, are you still there?”

He wasn’t sure. Was he still here?

“Yes … I … I don’t … Hyung, what am I supposed to do?”

_How do I be a leader when I can’t even remember how to be a human right now?_

“Just keep everybody where they are,” his manager gasped, and now Taeyong could hear the sound of a car door opening and closing. “I’m on my way back to you now. I have to hang up to drive so just keep it together until I’m there.”

The call ended. Just like that. As if anything made sense anymore.

Taeyong felt fused to his chair, superglued to the leather and paralysed with shock. He wanted to look online and get as much information from that article as he could but he was scared of what else he would find.

Who would do something like this? And why Chenle? Why that kid? He was just a little kid. Still a minor. Just about to turn nineteen. Who did that to a little kid?

Struck by something else his manager had said, Taeyong scrambled out of his seat and practically threw himself out into the hallway. The press conference was apparently due to start in a few minutes and he could not afford to miss it.

He’d missed enough already.

Skidding into the living room, he saw Donghyuck slumped on the couch, staring off into space with a kind of blank look in his eyes. Shocked to the very core. Just like Taeyong himself but without the pure undiluted panic.

Doyoung and Johnny’s voices were audible from within different rooms, probably as they tried to soothe whoever had called them in a fit of terror with a million questions. Taeyong just hoped the others were okay upstairs.

He snatched the TV remote up off the coffee table and found the channel in a matter of moments. Some part of him insisted that he remove Donghyuck from the room to spare him from having to hear any of this, but the rest of him was too frightened of it starting without him. 

Lee Soo Man, a guy Taeyong had learned to both hate and admire over the last decade. Half the time, he loathed the man’s guts for what he put them through, and the other half, he was overcome with gratitude for the opportunities he’d been handed.

God knew what he felt right now as he saw the CEO step up onto a raised platform and take his place behind a podium, illuminated by dozens of flashing camera lights as the reporters scrambled for a juicy piece of gossip.

Still standing, unable to even consider sitting down, Taeyong held his breath.

The man cleared his throat, gave the papers in front of him a useless shuffle, and then started to speak in a monotonous drone that showed just how indifferent he was to the gravity of their situation.

“I’m here today, unfortunately, to confirm the recent news regarding NCT’s Chenle. He was indeed abducted on the 10th from the members’ dormitory in Beijing and a ransom demand of ₩200 billion has been made.”

Behind Taeyong, he felt rather than heard Johnny and Doyoung emerging from their rooms to listen. The apartment had never been so silent. It was both eerie and uncomfortable.

“However …”

That wasn’t a good word. Never in history had that word ever preceded something good. That word was exactly what Taeyong hadn’t wanted to hear within these next few moments.

Chenle’s life could depend on that word.

“The company will not be able to pay the ransom. At ₩200 billion, we would go bankrupt and, as a result, that particular option is out of the question. The label has 73 artists. If we started paying ransoms now, we would have 73 kidnapped artists. We are negotiating with the culprits. That is all I can disclose for now.”

The camera flashes increased in intensity and the reporters all leapt out of their chairs to stick microphones forward and shout their questions as if they had the right to know anything regarding Chenle’s abduction.

The almighty CEO stepped off the stage with his head down and his eyes averted and followed the security guard’s direction to the door. He left the room without another word, without a smidgen of guilt or regret for the little kid he’d just condemned to death.

“Bastard …” came Johnny’s whispered English from the doorway. “Fucking bastard …”

“How could he say that?” Doyoung blurted, stumbling forwards a couple of steps as though he could reach through the TV screen and throttle his own boss. “How could … How the fuck could he say that?”

Donghyuck was completely silent.

It was decided then and there.

No matter what Lee Soo Man did in the future, even if he saved the turtles or donated the entire contents of his bank account to starving children in Yemen, Taeyong hated him with every cell in his body.

**02dys 15hrs 37min 12sec**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have so much work to do right now but I just want to keep working on this story. What is life and why does it hate every single person in the world? On a happier note, have a good day and send me some love if you have the time :)


	7. Strained And Toxic

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so swamped with work right now but, since it's Chenle's birthday, I felt like I had to post something. Sorry if this isn't up to my usual standards. I'll really try to pick up the pace with updates in the future. Thank you so much for all the love xx

“You can’t go in there!”

Renjun, quite frankly, ignored her.

The receptionist was a wispy woman, probably nearing the end of her fifties, and she’d always been incredibly sweet to him but it had been over an hour since he’d found out – from the fucking news no less – that his best friend was missing and he had no time to feel guilty.

Easily dodging past her pathetic attempts to bar him entry, he rammed his shoulder into the office door with a little more force than was necessary and stumbled a bit as he crossed the threshold. It was almost embarrassing how breathless he was.

Kun and Taeyong were already in there, a factor he should have foreseen considering how agonisingly long it took him to actually get here. An unnamed man he didn’t recognise was standing by the wall with his hands folded politely in front of him.

And Lee Soo Man was leaning on the edge of his desk, his feet crossed at the ankle and his arms intertwined over his chest as he surveyed the two – now three – idols before him with an expression of patient condescension. 

They seemed to be mid-argument. Kun was practically vibrating with fury, fists clenched at his sides and jaw set. Taeyong appeared to be calmer, but only just. He was sweating and shaking and his eyes were two watering wells of desperation.

The only reason Renjun noticed that was because they were suddenly fixed on him.

“Why are you here?” his leader hissed, but there was no anger there. Just fear. “Doyoung told you to stay in the dorm.”

As if Doyoung could tell him what to do.

“The others are still there,” Renjun assured him, mainly because he was concerned about Taeyong’s blood pressure. “But I deserve to be here.”

Chenle was his friend, too. His best friend. The only person he’d been able to talk to when he’d just arrived in Korea and still couldn’t speak the language as fluently. The person who most reminded him of home whenever he was missing his family. The reason he didn’t forget how to converse in his mother tongue.

If decisions were being made and blame was being cast on the man who had quite literally refused to pay for a teenager’s safe return then he, Renjun, was going to be here for it, and screw anybody who tried to convince him otherwise.

Muttering something under his breath, Taeyong turned his attention back to Kun who may or may not have been about to explode. He still hadn’t taken his eyes off his CEO, still hadn’t unclenched his fists, still hadn’t even opened his mouth.

“As I said before,” Soo Man sighed placatingly. “I know this must be exceedingly distressing for you all and I apologise for not being able to discuss things with you in advance. However, I stand by what I said –”

“Yeah, we know what you said!” Kun shouted, looking as if he wanted to lunge forwards and grab the man by the throat. It was a miracle he was still restraining himself. “The whole world knows what you said! The people who have Chenle know what you said!”

Renjun’s stomach flipped unpleasantly. Somehow, he’d been so caught up in his desperation to get here as quickly as possible and find out what the hell was going on that he hadn’t stopped to think about that. 

Those kidnappers – whoever they were – would have been watching that press conference. They would have heard their subject’s refusal to pay the ransom. They would know that their elaborate plan had failed.

What would their response be? Hurt Chenle? Send proof that they were hurting Chenle in an attempt to get Soo Man to reconsider? Or would they just cut their losses and kill the boy there and then?

Was he never going to see his best friend again?

What was the last thing he said to him? Was it kind? Or was it cruel teasing? He genuinely couldn’t remember. He should’ve flown to Beijing with him. He should’ve ditched the stupid radio show and gone with him.

Then he could’ve … Then he might’ve …

“We can’t pay the ransom,” Soo Man cemented, still with his arms and legs folded, looking as if he was merely waiting for the kettle to boil. “You’re intelligent boys. Surely you must understand that. If we pay, not only are we risking hundreds of jobs and putting ourselves into a mass of debt, we’re sending a very dangerous message to whoever fancies themselves a couple of billion won.”

Renjun hadn’t thought of that either. It was easy to forget the dozens upon dozens of staff members that would be made redundant if the company went bankrupt. It was easier to fixate on Chenle, locked up somewhere, alone and afraid.

If they weren’t paying the ransom, how were they planning on getting him back alive?

“Who’s to say they intend to release Chenle even if we cough up? They may keep him, try demanding more money. And if this story does have a picture-perfect ending, what’s stopping somebody else from trying the same thing?”

It was so logical but so wrong. Renjun couldn’t believe he was starting to agree with the reasoning of a man who wasn’t going to do everything in his power to rescue a child in captivity.

He put his face in his hands, wandering if he could just sink through the floor until he’d had enough time to process everything that was happening.

Somewhere to his left, Kun scoffed with incredulity, “Are you seriously refusing to pay the ransom? They’re going to kill him – actually fucking kill him – and you’re refusing to pay the ransom?”

Renjun raised his head. He’d known Kun a long time, long enough to know his relationship with Chenle was something that went beyond a brotherly bond, but never before had he heard that man sound so angry.

He was almost … feral

Soo Man sighed, as though nearing the end of his tether, “That is correct.”

“Fuck this!” Kun yelled, throwing his hands up in the air before fisting them in his hair. “You’re full of fucking shit!”

Renjun felt his eyes bulging out of his head. The person in front of him right now was unrecognisable as Qian Kun. Something had snapped inside his head and now he was volatile, violent, vicious. And he’d definitely just kissed his job goodbye.

“You’re a racist motherfucker! You know that, right?”

He started forwards and maybe would’ve even raised a fist if Renjun hadn’t grabbed his elbow in both hands. Part of him was frightened that he might get himself caught in the crossfire but he would rather his hyung punch him by accident than attack the head of their company and risk being arrested.

“You hate us!” Kun continued to rage, jabbing a finger at Soo Man’s face while Renjun continued to cling to his arm. “You always have! That’s why you won’t pay! None of this, ‘for the good of the company shit’! This is about you and your prejudice!”

“Kun …” Soo Man started, still without batting an eyelid. “I can assure you that –”

“If it was him, you’d pay!” Kun shrieked, gesturing wildly towards Taeyong who, until that moment, had been silently staring at the floor. “You’d sell the entire company to get him back! But an expendable little Chinese kid? Who gives a fuck about him, right? So long as the golden boy’s still here!”

Renjun’s gaze snapped to his leader’s face and he felt his heart tearing at the seams. Taeyong looked so unbelievably hurt, a couple of tears even welling up in his eyes as he gaped at Kun in utter disbelief.

But by far the worst thing of all was that he didn’t even try to defend himself.

Kun wrenched his arm from Renjun’s grip, span on the spot and kicked the nearest chair into the wall. One of the wooden legs popped off and splinter shards skittered over the carpet but nobody dared move to pick them up.

Everybody just stood there, watching Kun, waiting for what was coming next. Whether he was going to properly erupt or manage to bring himself back from the brink. They could practically feel the anger ebbing off him in waves.

There was a long time where nobody spoke. Soo Man’s expression was still neutral, Taeyong’s had gone blank and Renjun didn’t know what his was. He didn’t even know what he felt or how he was supposed to feel or if he was feeling anything at all.

Kun puts his hands on his hips, turned his eyes up towards the ceiling and blew out a heavy breath before slowly pivoting to face the rest of the room once more. He dropped his gaze to the carpet and when he spoke, his voice was much softer.

“I want to see the letter.”

Renjun frowned in confusion. What letter? He glanced over at Taeyong, then at Soo Man and saw equal expressions of bewilderment on their faces.

“The letter?”

“Yes!” Kun bit through gritted teeth. “The letter he wrote! I want to see it!”

Oh. _That_ letter. The one that had been sent to the newscasting station. The one that Chenle himself had written, maybe at gunpoint or under threat of serious bodily harm.

Soo Man let out another puff of air, something akin to resignation reflected in his features as he reached behind him and plucked a sheet of paper from the pile that had been accumulating there.

Renjun couldn’t take his eyes off the page as it was passed over, unable to move from his spot but praying that he would catch a glimpse of something – anything – that was even remotely Chenle.

Kun took one look at the note and scoffed yet again, “This is a photocopy. Where’s the real thing?”

“It’s at the police station,” Soo Man told him, calmly, coolly, as if all of this was just a natural daily occurrence for him. “They’re running forensics on it.”

Renjun understood Kun’s need to have that letter. He felt it, too. That was the only thing they had that Chenle had touched. The only thing that bore any resemblance to the real person he was and not the image of the kidnapped idol on the news.

“This isn’t right …” Kun murmured under his breath, brow suddenly furrowing as he inspected the sheet in his hands. “Why … This isn’t right. He wouldn’t write this.”

From where he was standing by the wall, the nameless man straightened, suddenly on the fullest alert. Renjun had actually forgotten he was even there but now he seemed to be all ears.

“What? What wouldn’t he write?”

“’I love my mother’,” Kun read out, holding up the page and pointing to one of the last lines. “He wouldn’t write that. He hates her. She wouldn’t care if he lived or died.”

It was true. Renjun knew very little about his friend’s relationship with his parents but he knew it had been strained and toxic throughout his entire childhood. If he remembered correctly, Chenle had moved out when he was fourteen to escape the life he’d led there.

To this day, he still refused to mention the woman who’d birthed him. Every time she popped up on the TV, he’d demand the channel be changed. If he saw her face on a newspaper, he turned it over. He hated that woman as much as she hated him.

Kun was right. He never would’ve said that he loved her, not even if he thought he was going to die.

At some point, Taeyong had sunken into the only remaining chair as though his bones no longer possessed the strength to hold him up, but Renjun couldn’t sit down. Instead, he slipped the page from Kun’s hand and squinted down at the words printed in black.

He could immediately feel the burn in his eyes.

That was Chenle’s handwriting. It was shakier and messier than it usually would’ve been but it was definitely his. A couple of characters had been blotted out by spots of moisture that distorted the ink into swollen bubbles.

Renjun had to lower the letter before he started to mimic the way Chenle must’ve cried as he’d been writing this. And why wouldn’t he? They’d forced their words upon him, made him explain how they would torture him if their demands weren’t met.

And there, right at the bottom, just above his signature, were those foreign words, _I love my mother._

“Chenle-ssi’s mother is the CEO of Syndicate’s, right? The designer clothing brand?”

It was the first time the man by the wall had spoken, beady eyes zipping from Soo Man to Kun, to Renjun and then back to Soo Man. Renjun had believed he was just a bodyguard, put there to ensure Kun didn’t go completely ape, but now he was starting to wonder.

He didn’t need to wonder for long.

“Who the fuck are you?” Kun quipped with absolutely no regard for the social hierarchy or the need for pleasantries in a formal setting. “And why is it any of your business?”

If the man was affronted by the unnecessarily rude address, he didn’t show it. Instead, he unclasped his hands from in front of him and stuck one out towards Kun, clearly waiting for a shake that Kun wasn’t about to reciprocate.

“Zhang Peng Fei,” he introduced himself, and Renjun’s ears pricked. Chinese? “I’m the private investigator Lee Soo Man-ssi hired to handle this case.”

Wait. What? Rewind. Go back. Huh?

Renjun looked to his CEO, searching for any sign of approval or refusal, but the man just inclined his head in acknowledgement.

“Private investigator?” Taeyong croaked weakly, speaking up for the first time in several minutes. “What’s wrong with the police?”

“Chenle-ssi was abducted from and is likely being held in China,” the man who called himself Peng Fei answered curtly, lowering his hand when it became clear that Kun wasn’t going to take it. “The Korean police have no jurisdiction there. Lee Soo Man-ssi appointed me as a correspondent, someone who will keep him informed regarding the investigations taking place in Beijing. If the police work there is inadequate, I will step in.”

Renjun just stared, still clutching the paper in both hands, still with his eyes burning from residual emotion. For some reason, none of this was sinking in. He couldn’t come to terms with every shock to his system and they were all building up into one colossal mess of complicated feelings and confused questions.

“As I said,” Soo Man interjected with his favourite phrase. “We’re negotiating with the kidnappers. Just because I don’t plan to pay the ransom doesn’t mean I’m leaving that boy to die. Peng Fei was trained in China. He’s familiar with cases like this. I only hire the best.”

Renjun returned his attention to Peng Fei, taking in the bulge in the biceps beneath his suit jacket and the strain that his shirt buttons were under. He certainly looked like he’d been trained in something. Renjun just wasn’t yet sure what that something was.

“So, now that we’ve got that out of the way, I’ll repeat my earlier question. Is Chenle-ssi’s mother the CEO of Syndicate’s?”

“Yes,” Renjun blurted before Kun could think up another way to be rude and dismissive. If this man was here to help them – to help Chenle – then they needed to cooperate with him. “She is, but they haven’t talked in years.”

“She’s got nothing to do with this,” Kun insisted, shooting Renjun a narrow-eyed glare that clearly told him to shut his mouth. “If anything, she’s the one who orchestrated this entire thing.”

Renjun blanched. Not just at the withering glower his hyung was giving him, but at the notion that a mother would order the abduction of her own child. Nobody was that fucked in the head, surely. She was filthy stinking rich, too. She owned one of the biggest clothing brands in the continent. Why would she need ₩200 billion?

Peng Fei frowned, “Why do you say that?”

“Because she’s a lying manipulative bitch!”

Was this what fear did to a person? Turned them into something unrecognisable? Where was the person who made pancakes in the kitchen at 6am so that there was something to eat when the rest of them woke up?

“Do you happen to have her number?” Peng Fei continued to push, digging in his back pocket for his phone. “If not, I’m sure I can find it online but if you have her private –”

“You’re not contacting her,” Kun interrupted, and suddenly there was a flare of panic in his voice. “You can’t.”

Taeyong rose from his chair and took a step forward, one hand flinching half-heartedly towards Kun. He looked as if he was debating whether or not trying to calm him through physical touch was a good idea.

“Chenle’s a minor, Kun,” he pointed out cautiously. “He’s still a child. We have to call his guardian.”

“She’s not his guardian!” Kun whirled around to bat away the hand that was reaching for his shoulder. “She has no rights to him! She disowned him four years ago so, I’m telling you, she’s not his guardian!”

Renjun had never heard any of this before. He’d thought Chenle was just another one of those teenagers with disappointing parents who’d run away from the family home as soon as he’d gotten the chance. He’d had no idea his mother had cut him out of her life.

“So, are you saying an underaged boy hasn’t had a guardian in four years?” Peng Fei cut in yet again, phone hovering halfway to his ear as he regarded Kun with a great deal of suspicion. “Was this process conducted legally? Because if it was, he should’ve been admitted into the care system.”

“Yes,” Kun gasped, and he sounded close to tears, almost like he was pleading. “It was done legally. He was adopted. It’s just not her so please don’t call her. I don’t want her in his life again.”

Taeyong was the one who spoke this time, “Kun, who adopted him?”

All eyes in the room were on that boy now. On the frenzied panic in his eyes, the heaving in his shoulders, the undoubtable thud of his pulse in his throat as he realised he was cornered and caught and the truth was going to come out no matter what he said or did now.

Abruptly, his posture drooped and his chin dropped to his chest and he brought his hands up to cover his face to such an extent that his whisper almost went unheard.

“Me.”

**02dys 17hrs 43min 18sec**


	8. Something Different

Chenle had decided that the worst part about all of this was the boredom.

The fear had somewhat faded. The panic wasn’t quite as paralysing. He was still apprehensive, uncertain and wary of everything that moved but he judged it to have been at least four days since he’d been dumped here and no one had hurt him.

They’d threatened to – of course, they’d threatened to – but that was only if the company outright refused to pay on live television in front of the entire country. He doubted they’d do that because, if anything, their stocks would plummet in response.

All he had to do was wait for some kind of update on the situation and he was bored out of his fucking mind.

If he stood on the table, he could just about see out of the window but there was nothing to look at except overgrown wilderness and the occasional black bird that was always scared away as soon as it sensed his presence.

The only human contact he received was when Xiaofei – or, occasionally, one of the others – brought him the same arduous meal of undercooked noodles and plain rice.

He’d decided he liked Xiaofei significantly more than he did anyone else, if it was even possible to like one of your kidnappers. Xiaofei sometimes ruffled his hair in a way that was almost affectionate, was never rough with him and never made jerky movements that Chenle knew were intended to make him believe he was about to be hit.

That’s what the others did. He didn’t like the others. So far, he’d met about three of them. They were always masked but he could see it in the eyes. To them, he was just a business product. They couldn’t care less whether he lived or died so long as they got their money.

Xiaofei was different. Chenle didn’t quite know why yet but he was different. Maybe it was a tactic. Maybe the man was trying to gain his trust just so he could tear him to pieces when the time came, but somehow that didn’t seem to be the case.

He wasn’t kind, but he wasn’t aggressive either, and Chenle supposed that was something he could be grateful for considering the nature of his situation.

His cell consistently stank of cigarettes. Every time somebody unlocked the screechy door to bring him his daily meal, it was like a wave of ash and smog washed over him and he had to suppress the urge to cough and splutter until his visitor had left again.

They all smoked. He could hear them outside, asking each other for lights, and sometimes he could even see the little silvery wisps of tobacco mist floating past his room.

The only thing he could do to pass the time was write. Xiaofei still hadn’t returned to take the pen or the paper he’d left Chenle with two days previously and so that was his only mercy.

He’d considered more than once whether or not he would be able to conceal himself behind the cell door, wait until it was opened and then jam the pen into one of his captors’ throats but that had been more of a fantasy than a genuine plan.

Even if he did possess the emotional strength to do something so violent to another human being, he knew there were at least half a dozen more that would take him down before he took even three steps.

So, he wrote, because that was the only thing he could do.

The amount of paper he had was limited so he kept his letters small and narrow and Korean. Because if one of his jailors found them, he didn’t want them to be able to read what they said. Of course, they might be able to speak Korean, but it was all he had.

He wrote to Kun, to Taeyong, to Mark, to Jisung and Renjun and Jaemin and Sicheng and everybody he loved. Everybody he hoped was doing everything they could to bring him back.

The probability that they would ever see any of it was low and he was telling himself that he would be back in their arms before they had a chance to anyway, but there was a deep-seated anxiety that grew and grew inside his gut with each passing day.

If he died here, if they decided he wasn’t worth the hassle and they were just going to kill him, his members would never get a goodbye. They might never know what happened to him and whether or not he suffered.

So, he told them.

He told them about everything he’d endured since arriving here, how he was allowed to eat and at least given a bed to sleep on and how it really wasn’t so bad considering how much worse it could’ve been. How they didn’t hurt him and mainly left him alone. How he’d even formed some kind of bond with one of them.

He told them that he loved them unconditionally and that, if they never saw him again, they should know that he was thankful for the part they’d played in his lives.

Every night, before he curled up with his jacket and the scratchy blankets, he folded the papers and wedged them beneath the rear leg of the bed frame just in case he was killed during the night or they decided to move him and he never got a chance to put them somewhere the police might find them if they ever tracked him back to this place.

He could only hope it wouldn’t come to that.

But that was the thing. All he had right now was hope.

He was doodling in the corner of his page, kneeling on the floor beside the table with his chin propped up on his hand, almost managing to convince himself that he was at home in the living room, when he heard the footsteps.

They were angry. Speedy. They would be on top of him in a matter of seconds and whoever they belonged to was most certainly not happy.

Scrambling to fold the papers back up again, he stuffed them clumsily beneath the blankets on the bed and stumbled to his feet. He pressed his back to the wall and turned to face the door of his cell just as his gargantuan nemesis stormed into view.

Even with the masks, he was starting to be able to tell them apart. They had different gaits, statures, tones of voice, shapes and colours of their eyes. This one, though, this one he would know from fifty feet away just because of the sheer broadness of his shoulders.

He was huge, and he was the one Chenle was most afraid of.

The padlock made a hideous shriek as it was wrestled into submission and he didn’t have the time to do anything more than breathe before there was a monster in his cell with its gloved hands reaching for his throat.

He was shoved backwards into the wall, a few clumps of dust dislodging themselves from the brick mortar. The intruder loomed over him, fingers around his neck, keeping him pinned up against the stone.

His grip wasn’t tight enough to cut off airflow. It was more of a threat. Like a warning. _Do exactly what I say or else I’ll break your spinal cord clean in half._

Even so, Chenle’s body locked. He could feel his eyes going wide and his face going pale as he stared up into the beady black eyes peeping through the balaclava. He kept his arms at his sides, unwilling to raise them in case it triggered some kind of violent response.

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” came the snarl.

Chenle could only blink. He didn’t understand. He hadn’t done anything wrong. Even if they knew about the notes he’d been writing, surely that wasn’t grounds for this kind of treatment.

Was he going to die here? Was his neck going to be snapped? Was he going to be choked until he ran out of air? Was his head going to be slammed repeatedly into a wall until his skull shattered? Would he even be told why?

If it was possible to feel one’s heart in their head, that’s what Chenle could feel at that moment.

“How much of a spoilt little brat were you that your company won’t even pay?”

What …?

“I …” Chenle croaked, trying and failing to think of something he was supposed to say in response. “I don’t … I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

They weren’t paying? They were leaving him here? To die? Like this? At the hands of these people? They weren’t even trying to negotiate? Beg for his life? Do anything more than simply refuse and move on with their business?

The man in front of him scoffed before releasing his grip on his captive and taking a step back, surveying him with an air of the greatest disgust, “You really are worthless.”

Chenle’s knees trembled, threatening to give out from beneath him at any moment. He reached behind him and dug his fingers into the crumbling brickwork as if that would be able to support him when his entire skeleton felt like it had turned to mush.

They weren’t paying.

They weren’t paying.

They weren’t paying.

But they had to. He was going to lose his life if they didn’t. How had this been allowed to happen? The fans wouldn’t let this happen. His members wouldn’t let this happen.

Kun wouldn’t let this happen.

“Might as well kill you right now …”

Chenle’s head snapped up at the speed of light and he felt his pulse skyrocketing as the man before him procured a knife from his pocket. The blade was at least five inches long and the edge was serrated with the intent to cause pain of the greatest intensity.

And Chenle folded.

“No …” he gasped, sliding down the wall in an attempt to make himself look as small and harmless as possible. “No … They’ll … They’ll pay … Just … You just have to give them time … Please … I can … I can make them pay if you just let me speak to them … I’ll … I’ll make them pay …”

He had no idea if that was the truth but his only focus at that point was on the razor-sharp tip of the knife being twirled between his captor’s fingers. Tears pricked his eyes at the thought of that thing puncturing his body. 

“Please …”

The brute lunged forwards, leather-coated fingers seizing Chenle’s wrist in a grip so tight he could literally feel the blood vessels breaking beneath the skin. He was wrenched forwards far too violently for his jellified legs to keep up, causing him to trip and collide with the edge of the table.

His forehead bounced off the wooden corner and pain exploded behind his eyes but it was impossible to pay attention to anything other than his hand being pinned to the centre of the table.

_They say they’ll cut off my finger._

“No!” Chenle screamed through a sob, tears spilling over as he frantically tried to wriggle free. “No! Please! I can make them pay! I’ll make them pay! Just please … Please don’t!”

He lashed out with his other hand and grabbed hold of the arm that wielded the knife, trying his goddamn hardest to push it away from his fragile fingers and failing miserably.

His vision was blurred through the tears. The table was squeaking against the floor with every movement that he made. His captor threw off his grip and brought the knife to his index finger and Chenle _screamed._

“Hey!”

Never in his wildest dreams would Chenle have predicted that he would be relieved to hear one of his kidnapper’s voices, but as Xiaofei strode into the cell with a look of enraged bewilderment in his eyes, that was exactly what he felt.

A humiliating whimper slipped free of his throat as he looked down at his hand and saw that the blade had barely nicked the skin of his knuckle. A single droplet of blood was beading on the surface but the finger was still there.

“What the fuck are you doing?”

“Going through with our promise,” the knifeman grunted, clearly irritated by the interruption. “They said they wouldn’t pay and we said we’d make them.”

Chenle gazed pleadingly up at Xiaofei, praying that the tears staining his face and shimmering in his eyes would be enough to convince him that this wasn’t okay. His hand was starting to go numb from the tightness of the grip around it.

He wished he could read the expression on the newcomer’s face but the only thing he had to go on were his eyes.

“It’s barely been twenty-four hours,” Xiaofei quipped. “We said we’d wait them out, put them on edge before we made contact again.”

“Fuck that!” Knifeman snapped back. “We gotta show them we ain’t fucking around or else they’re not gonna cough up, are they?”

There was tension. Chenle could feel it now. These two did not like each other, were probably competing for the role of leader in this operation. They were both clearly alpha males, unhappy that somebody else was threatening their territory.

A confrontation was inevitable at this point, and Xiaofei had better win.

“They said they’d negotiate, right? They ain’t gonna do that if you start hacking the boy to pieces.”

“If we don’t send them a clear message, how the fuck do you expect them to take us seriously?”

“They gotta, remember? That’s why we made them announce it on live TV. This boy’s got millions of fans in his corner. You think they’re just gonna sit down and shut up about this? Now quit being a whiny little bitch and leave the kid alone.”

There was a split second where the two of them simply stared each other down. Chenle felt caught in the middle, like a rabbit stuck between two snarling foxes. He tried to keep his breathing as quiet as possible, tried to melt into the background, tried to hush his tears.

“You’re too fucking soft, you know that?” Knifeman spat, straightening up from where he’d been crouched beside the table and finally letting go of Chenle’s wrist. “I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt this time around but I’m warning you … If that money don’t get paid, I’m chopping off body parts until it does.”

He stormed out of the cell, slamming into Xiaofei’s shoulder as he went, and Chenle practically fell back against the wall. He clutched his bruised wrist to his chest, nursing his bleeding finger, and pressed his lips together to muffle the sobs.

That had been too close. Any sense of security he’d had here was now gone and he knew he’d been stupid to believe it had ever existed. He wasn’t safe. Of course, he wasn’t safe. He was at these people’s mercy. Whatever they wanted to do, they could do it.

If Xiaofei hadn’t … Xiaofei.

Chenle opened his eyes, using his sleeve to wipe at the moisture that obscured his vision.

His saviour was still in the cell but he had his back to the prisoner, facing the open door with one hand on his hip and another appearing to be rubbing the stress out of his eyes.

He’d removed his mask.

Chenle didn’t know what to do. He couldn’t see the man’s face since he was still turned away from him but he caught a glimpse of stubble, a small scar on the curve of his jaw and dark skin, like Xuxi’s.

His hair was mussed from the balaclava, slightly longer at the top and practically shaved to a buzz-cut at the back. He wasn’t as young as he first seemed, either. Maybe early thirties?

Chenle’s breath hitched before he could stop it. Xiaofei whipped around and their eyes locked from across the stone cell.

And Chenle knew that was it.

No matter what kind of protective instincts Xiaofei held for him, no matter how strong his moral compass was, there was absolutely no way that his captive would be permitted to live now that he’d seen his face.

They’d tried so hard – all of them – to protect their identities from him and it had given him hope that maybe they did intend to release him after all, but now those hopes were dashed to smithereens and Chenle knew he was going to die.

He wanted to look away, shut his eyes before he could manage to commit any of those features to his memory, but he couldn’t move. And from the way he seemed to be frozen to the spot, neither could Xiaofei.

It was like a stalemate. Each of them waiting for the other to react and neither of them wanting to be the first to admit that the only reason Chenle had been permitted to stay alive had just been rendered moot.

Very, very slowly, Xiaofei lifted a finger to his lips.

“I won’t tell if you won’t,” he whispered, and the look in his eyes was almost pleading.

He really didn’t want to hurt him and that was great because Chenle really didn’t want to be hurt.

Once again, he was struck with the thought that there was something about Xiaofei, something in his story that made him different from the others out there.

Wordlessly, Chenle nodded.

Xiaofei backed out of the cell, keeping his gaze on the boy at all times until the door was closed and locked behind him. Just as he was about to walk away, he glanced up through the bars and met Chenle’s stare once again.

“You breathe a word,” he warned. “And I’ll cut your eyes out myself.”

Wordlessly, Chenle nodded. 

**05dys 01hrs 02min 00sec**


	9. Human Beings

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so sorry for the wait! I got so caught up with school work that I completely forgot where I was supposed to be going with this but I'm back now and on a break for the holidays so hopefully there will be more updates in the near future.
> 
> TRIGGER WARNING: There are descriptions of psychological abuse, mistreatment of a child and also mentions of suicide in this chapter so please be wary.

“Sit down.”

Kun didn’t need to be told twice.

He hadn’t stopped moving in days. Even the plane ride from Beijing to Seoul had been wrought with nervous fidgeting. His legs were exhausted. The rest of him was exhausted, too. To take some weight off his feet and finally allow himself a second to relax – somewhat – was exactly what he hadn’t known he needed.

Peng Fei settled into the chair on the opposite side of the table, pulling something smooth, rectangular and black out of his jacket pocket and placing it between them. It took Kun a moment to recognise it as a Dictaphone. 

The conference room was on SM’s top floor. Hardly anyone ever ventured up there and even when they did, they didn’t stay long. Nobody was going to interrupt them and somehow the idea of it was toying with Kun’s nerves.

He’d known that this moment would have to come but that didn’t make him any better prepared for it. The secrets he was about to divulge were ones he’d believed he would take to his grave, for his own sake as much as Chenle’s.

What would that boy think of him now if he knew he was spilling the information they’d both sworn never to speak of again?

“You need to tell me, Kun,” Peng Fei prompted, folding his arms atop the table and leaning forwards slightly in his chair. “We have to know everything if we’re going to stand a chance at finding him.”

Kun allowed his eyes to flutter closed. He tried to convince himself that this wasn’t a betrayal, that he was breaking his promise because Chenle was in danger and that should be the only thing that mattered, but it was just so hard to dredge up the past and the memories that came with it.

If anyone else found out … The members, the management, the media …

But Chenle was in danger, and that was the only thing that mattered.

“She never wanted him,” Kun started, keeping his eyes closed as though that would help him believe this stranger wasn’t there, listening to every word. “He was an unplanned pregnancy and his father took off as soon as he found out. She uses that story in interviews now to make it seem like it was her against the world, that she brought herself up from nothing for the sake of her child, but she was just too conservative to get an abortion and that’s the only reason he was even born at all.”

He felt the embers of anger starting to glow deep within his gut after years of dormancy. One of the many reasons he’d so readily agreed to keep the past a secret was that he simply could not control his fury whenever he even thought about what that woman – the monster who called herself Chenle’s mother – had done.

“She was lazy with all her vitamins and medications, she deliberately overworked herself and so he was born premature. Twenty-four weeks. He spent the first couple of years of his life in and out of hospital and this was about the time that she started gaining publicity so, of course, she had to pay for all the treatments in order to make herself look good for the media. I think she always resented him for that.”

Nobody else had any idea. Whenever she appeared on TV to give motivational speeches or exclusive interviews on how she’d risen through the ranks of a strictly misogynistic system to become the glamorous entrepreneur she was, the media clamoured to feed her ego.

If they knew the way she behaved behind closed doors … If they’d seen it for themselves first hand, like Kun had, then they would axe her in a heartbeat.

But she had a sob story, and didn’t everybody just love a sob story? 

“From the age of eight, she was leaving him alone unsupervised for weeks on end while she went on business trips. If he didn’t get perfect grades, she’d make him stand in the corner and hold his textbooks over his head until she figured he’d learnt his lesson and would study harder. She forced him to trail behind her, smile for the cameras, be her perfect little angel so long as everybody was watching but as soon as they were out of the public eye, she couldn’t have given a damn about him.”

His eyes were still closed. It was the only way he could get through this without needing to slam his fist into the table or kick the nearest wall.

“He told me that she’d once said the reason she worked so hard while she was pregnant with him was that she was hoping she’d have a miscarriage. She’d constantly call him the bane of her existence, say that she wished he’d died as soon as he was born and that her life would be so much easier if he’d just kill himself.”

That was when he had to pause. He could remember that conversation, almost exactly a year ago, when Chenle had worked himself up and confessed some of the worst moments of his childhood.

Human beings should never treat each other like that.

“I don’t think she ever really beat him – aside from a few smacks and slaps – but she abused him from the moment she realised he was in her belly. I know there’s still a lot that he hasn’t told me about what she did to him for all those years.”

And he might never get the chance, the evil little voice in Kun’s head reminded him, accompanied by a pang of dread in his chest. He had to push the thought aside before it could grow into something untameable.

Chenle would come home. Chenle would be fine. That was why Kun was doing this: to give Peng Fei the information he needed to find him and bring him back. Safe. Alive. Fine. 

“When he was fourteen, he ran here, to Korea, and auditioned for SM. She cut off all his financial aids, threatened to sue him – actually _sue_ her own son – and even sent some security dudes to try and drag him back to China. She wanted her little poster child back but he was done with living that life so he filed for emancipation. I helped him. He was still just a little kid and we knew there was no chance he wouldn’t be tossed into the foster system if the documents went through. He’d have to leave the company, abandon his ambitions, he wouldn’t get to be a singer and that was the most important thing to him. Music was probably the only comfort that got him through his childhood and he’d almost definitely lose it if he had to be put into care.”

Tears started to gather behind his closed eyelids. He was too tired to wipe them away.

“So, I adopted him. I’d just turned twenty so I was barely legal myself but the system is overworked and understaffed and they wanted to get us out of the way as quickly as possible so they approved me and … then he was mine. Officially. He still is.”

Finally, he opened his eyes.

Peng Fei was still sitting in the exact same position, watching him with an expressionless slate of a face as the Dictaphone continued to lap the story up into its mechanics.

There was no opinion there. No personal perspective. He was just … listening.

Kun sighed, bringing his hands up to scrub mindlessly at his face, “It was far too complicated to ever explain it to anyone else and we’ve never really even talked about it among the two of us. It feels strange, you know? He’s like my kid, but also my brother and I suddenly had this teenager that I was solely responsible for feeding and clothing but he was already so independent yet traumatised and scarred – so, so scarred – by what that witch did to him for so long.

When she found out what he was doing – that I was going to take him – she went ballistic. Threatened to sue me, beat me, kill me, everything under the sun. She tried guilt-tripping him, begging him to come home, saying that she was sorry, and when that didn’t work, she tried to kidnap him again but eventually she gave up. They haven’t spoken since and I’d like to keep it that way.”

Peng Fei nodded slowly, glancing down at the recording device between them before interjecting a curt, “His father?”

“Chenle reached out to him a few years ago but he has his own family now and I think that was too painful for Chenle to stay in contact with him,” Kun relayed robotically before sagging in his seat.

How many days had it been now? Six? Seven? Had it really been an entire week since his little brother – the child he was legally responsible for – was snatched away from him? And he still couldn’t bring himself to the point where he believed it was even real at all.

“I’m all he has,” he murmured. “I can’t take credit for who he is now because that was all him – he’s been fighting his own battles since before he had braces – but … he’s mine, and I’d die for him.”

Silence followed his declaration. Peng Fei seemed busy mulling over the new facts in his head and Kun was just too tired to speak any more. Too numb to even feel the hunger that must have been clawing at his insides after almost a week of barely any food.

He would give anything, he would even saw his own arm off with a butter knife, for the chance to speak to Chenle even if it was just for a split second. Just to hear his voice and convince himself that he was still alive, still fighting, still holding on and waiting for them to get him out of there.

Did he know by now? That his company was refusing to pay the ransom?

“Is there anything else you can give me on his mother?” Peng Fei probed, cutting Kun out of his internal monologue. “Or just anyone he might have come into contact with who could potentially want to do something like this?”

Kun resisted the urge to scoff. It wasn’t like Chenle was a member of a gang. He didn’t do drugs, didn’t hang about on street corners or pick fights with the local mafia. As if he’d have the time.

How was he supposed to have interacted with someone so deranged they would publicly kidnap him and demand a ransom no company in their right mind would pay?

“His mother’s the only one I can think of right now,” he supplied. “She’s done some seriously shady stuff in the past. There’s no one else that would –”

“What kind of shady stuff?”

“You mean, besides abusing her son his entire life?” Kun snarked, before biting his own tongue and cutting himself off. Getting snappy wasn’t going to help anybody. “You’re familiar with the clothing brand she runs, right?”

Everybody was. It was one of the most successful in the continent, billions rolling in every year to feed the families of those who slaved away in its name. Or, at least, that’s what the shiny brochures and smiley spokespeople claimed.

Kun knew better.

Peng Fei bobbed his head yet again, “20% of their annual profit goes to charity, right? That’s the reason they’re so popular?”

“Wrong.”

Peng Fei raised an eyebrow.

“There was this whole thing back in 2018,” Kun waffled, trying to pick out only the most necessary details so they could proceed with questions that would actually help them find Chenle. “They say they support all these charities and stuff, but they were really just pocketing the money that was supposedly going towards them. It went to trial and everything, but Chenle’s mother has connections in high places. She pulled some strings and got off with nothing more than a fine and paid some people to keep the story out of the papers. Then there was the fire …”

“Fire?” Peng Fei parroted carefully, now hanging on Kun’s every word. “You mean, the Guilin fire? The one where all those factory workers died?”

Kun hummed in affirmation, “Turns out, the building wasn’t properly assessed under fire safety regulations and they used to lock the employees in there during the day so that they couldn’t leave. When the machine malfunctioned and the whole place went up, they couldn’t get out.”

It still brought shivers to his spine at the thought. Even now, he could picture the news broadcaster reporting the events of that terrible day as a live video feed of a building engulfed in flames played out beside her head.

“Again, they brushed it all under the rug,” he continued before he could delve any further into the images his mind conjured up. “Said it was an accident, paid the victims’ families enough to keep them quiet and threatened anyone who tried to dig into what really happened. But none of this has anything to do with Chenle getting …”

And then it hit him.

Like a tonne of bricks.

“Oh, fuck …”

Peng Fei must have come to exactly the same conclusion because he was suddenly out of his chair, stuffing the Dictaphone into his pocket and grappling with his regular phone while simultaneously storming towards the door.

“Wait!” Kun cried breathlessly, trying to get up to follow him but finding his legs too weak to do more than wobble beneath him. “This … This doesn’t mean what I think it means, right?”

Peng Fei paused, hand on the doorknob, phone already stapled to his ear, and glanced over his shoulder at where the idol stood clinging to the table for support and silently pleading with everything he had.

“I have to make some calls,” was the only thing he said before he was gone.

Kun collapsed back into his chair with a lifeless evaporation of his bones. He never should’ve allowed himself to sit down in the first place because now it seemed as if his body was prepared never to get up again.

Very slowly, he eased himself forwards until his elbows could prop themselves up on his knees and his hands could conceal his face from the world.

He should have realised it sooner. He should have been quicker. He should have told Peng Fei, the police, even those officers who arrived at the dorm that night. Maybe then they already would’ve found Chenle by now.

What if they were too late? What if these guys had exacted their revenge already? What if Kun’s blatant stupidity and inability to draw rational conclusions from the information he had was what cost that kid his life?

It made so much sense now.

The publicity. The note. The reason for taking him in the first place.

But this wasn’t good. Absolutely none of this was good. Even if it was a breakthrough, even if it had given them their first solid lead since the whole nightmare began, it wasn’t good and it wouldn’t come anywhere close to it.

These people … probably had nothing to lose. That was why they were doing this. They’d already lost whatever loved one was holding their life together and now they were just out for payback. It would explain why they weren’t afraid of the police.

They didn’t just want money. They wanted blood. They wanted somebody – _Chenle’s mother –_ to suffer the same way that they’d suffered when they found out their families had burned to death, trapped inside that building where they’d laboured for months in terrible conditions and with next to no pay.

They’d taken her son. They’d forced him to declare a false love for her in that letter so that there was no chance she would be able to detach herself from the situation.

Kun hadn’t been on the news at all lately but he was willing to bet that a decent number of reporters would be swarming her headquarters, her home, anywhere they thought they could find her. She couldn’t escape without doing something or else the whole world would know who she really was and what despicable acts she’d committed.

But these people, the loved ones of those victims, must know that she didn’t care for her son. So, they broadcasted it on national television in the country her child was most popular. They contacted Kun, the only real parental figure Chenle had ever and was ever going to have, to be sure that he would take action.

There was a chance this wasn’t about the money at all. Maybe they were out for compensation or maybe they just wanted to destroy the company who’d taken something from them. Either way, the chances of Chenle being returned even if the ransom was paid …

“No …” Kun hissed under his breath, still hiding his face in his hands. “Don’t … Don’t …”

He couldn’t allow himself to think like that. He had to believe that the faceless thugs he’d pictured in his head were really just grieving relatives. They were human beings pushed to breaking point by a terrible tragedy that could have so easily been avoided.

They weren’t monsters. They wouldn’t maim or murder an innocent child. They’d left Yangyang alone when they could’ve put a bullet through his brain in the street outside the dormitory. Surely that meant something.

Surely, they were only interested in the woman who’d caused their pain.

Surely, they wouldn’t take out their grief and their anger on the boy whose only crime was being her child. 

“God, Chenle …”

He should’ve done more. He should’ve been a better guardian. That kid was his responsibility in every way, shape and form. It was his duty to protect him from anything and everything that tried to harm him and yet that was exactly what he’d failed to do.

And what was worse, he’d taken the anger he held for himself and had directed it onto others.

Yangyang believed the abduction was his fault because Kun hadn’t told him otherwise. Taeyong was undoubtedly holed up somewhere right now, wondering why it couldn’t have been him instead because Kun had been the one to put the idea in his head.

What was he becoming? What would Chenle say if he could see him now?

It was all too overwhelming. He had a thousand things to do and no idea in which order he had to do them.

He had to apologise to Yangyang and Taeyong and everyone else he’d yelled at over the course of this nightmare. He had to beg Lee Soo Man not to fire him for what he’d said during his rampage in that office. He had to find Peng Fei and get him to disclose what the next steps were in locating Chenle.

He had to find that woman – that _evil, evil_ woman – and make her understand that she needed to do whatever it took to get her son back, even if it meant emptying her bank account and grovelling for forgiveness on her knees in front of a sea of flashing cameras.

He shot out of his chair far too quickly and far too abruptly and it suddenly occurred to him as the world tilted sideways and the floor came rushing up to meet him that he should probably start by having something to eat.

**07dys 14hrs 23min**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bit of a shorter and more boring chapter, but it was necessary to get across some pretty vital information, don't you think? Let me know what you think will happen and what you want to happen and if there's anything in particular you'd like to see in the next updates?


	10. The Better Friend

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy Holidays, everyone! :)

Chenle’s room was small. All their rooms were. It was the only way to fit so many into one dormitory. But Chenle’s room was smallest. He’d lost the game of rock, paper, scissors that they’d played to decide.

On the inside of the door was a promotional poster for ‘Black On Black’, eighteen of them leaning up against each other as they gazed penetratingly up at the camera. He’d been meaning to replace it with the one for ‘Resonance’, but the company hadn’t released it.

Why advertise an album when the artists were too dead inside to release it? Why advertise an album when one of those artists may be too dead altogether?

There was the wardrobe in the corner, stretching from floor to ceiling. One of its nobs was missing. Jeno had accidentally broken it off one day when they were goofing around. The desk was beside it, taken up mostly by his gaming console, laptop and mess of notes he’d made about all the choreographies he needed to learn and lyrics he needed to memorise.

The bed was on the other side. The sheets were white but there was a large ginger stain in the corner that just hadn’t come out no matter how many cups of washing powder they’d poured into the machine alongside it. Jisung could still remember the day he dropped his ramen onto the covers.

A line of plushies stood to attention on top of the pillow. Some of them were gifts from fans, some of them were ones he’d bought for himself or won in a stupid arcade claw game. His basketball rested on the floor beside the headboard. His Stephen Curry jersey was hanging on the back of the desk chair.

Jisung sat on the ground, back against the wall, looking at each and every artefact that held Chenle’s scent, his fingerprints, traces of him and only him. He wondered how long it would take for all those things to be worn away by time.

There was a soft knock on the door and it creaked open, Mark’s faded pink hair peeking through the crack before his face came into view. His eyes softened at the sight of Jisung, curled up in the corner like a frightened child, and he shuffled over to join him without hesitation.

“You’re in here again,” he observed as he made himself somewhat comfortable on the unforgiving wooden boards. “It’s probably not healthy, Jisung.”

So what? None of this was healthy. Being without Chenle wasn’t healthy. Waking up every morning in blissful ignorance only to remember that his best friend wasn’t going to be sitting at the breakfast table when he entered the kitchen wasn’t healthy.

How healthy was Chenle right now? Was he starving? Dehydrated? Sleep-deprived? Frightened? Having panic attacks? Being tortured? Yelled at? Smacked around and degraded? Was he all alone in the darkness without any human contact at all?

“How long are we going to leave it?” Jisung croaked, allowing his head to roll back into the wall as he stared lifelessly at the opposite corner. “How long before we pack up all this stuff and throw it out?”

He didn’t need to glance over to know that Mark was giving him one very confused and questioning look.

“Why would we throw it out?” he asked hoarsely. “Why would we pack it up at all? He’s … coming back, Jisung. Okay? He’s coming back.”

But Jisung was tired of lying to himself.

“It’s easier to start trying to accept it now. Otherwise, it’ll make it so much more painful when they actually find his body.”

“Jisung –”

“Don’t give me some bullshit about positivity and having faith,” the maknae snapped, oblivious to the disrespect in his tone or the fact that Mark didn’t even seem to be bothered by it. “They demanded a ransom, we refused. It’s been a week and we haven’t heard a word from them. They killed him and bailed. It’s the only explanation.”

He’d thought it over for hours every night and it was the only theory that made sense. Why else would there be complete radio silence when communication was kind of a key aspect of this scenario?

The private detective – Peng Fei or whatever his name was – insisted that the kidnappers were just trying to scare them, leave them waiting long enough for them to be overcome with relief and willing to pay any sum of money when they finally did hear from the people holding their friend again. Apparently, it was a common tactic among hostage takers.

But Jisung had decided the moment he heard his company CEO announce to the world that Chenle’s life wasn’t worth saving. He wasn’t going to be one of those pathetic family members who sat by the phone and waited for years and years without hearing anything back.

The likelihood that his youngest hyung was still alive was getting slimmer with every passing day and sooner or later, they were going to have to start processing the inevitable. The earlier they began, the less pain they would feel.

“Don’t do that,” Mark murmured from beside him. “Don’t write him off like that. You can’t just decide that he’s dead because you think that makes it easier for you. That’s not fair on him.”

Jisung opened his mouth to retort, but no sound came out. He had nothing to say and he was too tired to come up with a proper argument. He merely dropped his chin to his chest and blew out a long, long breath.

“He was supposed to be my best friend.”

“He still is, Jisung,” Mark rebuked, and now he sounded like he was really losing his temper.

There would’ve been a time when Jisung felt guilty or maybe even fearful to receive a reaction like that. It seemed so weird to think that that time was less than two weeks ago. How bizarre it was that things could change so quickly.

“How many years since we met?” Jisung continued, unsure if he was still speaking to Mark or if he was now having a conversation with himself. “How many years did we share a room? How many times did we talk, just the two of us? And he never told me that his mum did all that shit to him.”

It seemed that Mark didn’t have an instant reply to that. Jisung wasn’t even sure he wanted one. He didn’t understand what it was he was feeling but the only word that appeared to be even remotely close was betrayal.

Not because Chenle had lied to him every time he asked about his childhood but because Chenle – his _best friend_ – hadn’t trusted him enough to share that kind of secret.

“And Kun-hyung,” he scoffed incredulously, raising his head and turning to face Mark as he spoke. “He’s … What? Like, his dad? Or his brother or … You’d think he’d tell me something like that, right? You’d think that was something I was worthy of knowing.”

“Jisung … He was abused.”

“Yeah, I know that.”

“No,” Mark interrupted, injecting a sharpness into his tone that left no room for dispute. “You don’t, because you didn’t live through what he did. Years and years of psychological violence inflicted on him by the person who should’ve loved him the most. It doesn’t get more painful than that. So, if it was you, Jisung, would you want to talk about it? Ever?” 

And now Jisung felt stupid. Stupid and selfish. He’d never thought of it that way. It had never occurred to him that Chenle was keeping his mouth shut to protect himself from having to relive a decade and a half of abuse.

“But he could’ve just talked to me,” he offered up pathetically. “I could’ve … I could’ve been someone who listened to him and told him that none of it was his fault and I could’ve been … I don’t know. A better friend?”

Everything felt like it was just too much. Since he’d found out what had led to Chenle’s separation from his mother and the resulting adoption, he hadn’t stopped thinking about how long his hyung had suffered in silence.

When he first joined as a trainee, he used to flinch whenever someone even slightly raised their voice or lifted a hand, as though he was expecting to be screamed at or slapped in the face. He’d grown out of it and Jisung had thought nothing of it.

Maybe if he’d pushed a little harder, he would’ve been able to get Chenle to open up. Maybe he would’ve been able to help him work through some of the emotions he’d been stashing deep down inside.

“You can be a better friend,” Mark said, giving Jisung’s shoulder a gentle nudge with his elbow. “When he comes home. He will come home.”

“But he might not,” Jisung fired back. “These people … They took him to get back at his mother, right? Because it was her fault that all those workers died. If they want to hurt her as much as they hurt then, surely, they’ll just kill him as soon as they make her go bankrupt.”

He raked his fingers through his unwashed hair and tried not to ask himself if Chenle was getting the opportunity to shower or at least take care of basic personal hygiene. He wasn’t sure how a hostage was supposed to be treated when they’d never actually done anything wrong.

Mark’s arm snaked around his shoulders and before he knew what he was doing, Jisung was leaning into his hyung’s body and allowing his aching muscles to finally let somebody else take their weight.

He was terrified all the time, constantly waiting for the phone to ring or a police officer to show up at their door with the news that their missing member had washed up on some shoreline in China.

Being stuck in a cycle of terror so profound that it left him unable to sleep at night was slowly draining the life force out of him. He was exhausted, he was angry but most of all, he was worried.

Worried that he’d never get a chance to be that better friend.

“I don’t know what’s going to happen,” came the solemn whisper in his ear as Mark stroked his thumb back and forth over the youngest’s upper arm. “But I know that if these people want their money, they’re going to have to keep him alive. The police are investigating. We’ve got Peng Fei and he seems pretty capable if you ask me.”

He certainly did. The man was massive. Pure muscle made of twisted steel. He’d spent a decade in the most hardcore military unit that existed, negotiated with terrorists, talked suicide bombers down from the ledge and jumped out of planes to save hostages in the desert.

If anyone was qualified enough to track down Chenle’s abductors and bring them to justice, he was.

“Speaking of,” Mark breathed. “He, Kun-hyung and Ten-hyung left for Beijing about an hour ago. They should be boarding the plane and taking off any minute.”

Jisung raised his head, blinking blearily up at his big brother with confusion, “Why didn’t you tell me? I would’ve gone, too.”

Mark snorted, “You and everybody else. You think they were the only two who volunteered?”

No, he supposed not. Of course, they would all want to be there. They all deserved to be there. They were Chenle’s family. They were the people he needed most in the world. If he ever made it out of this, they were the ones he was going to want to see first.

Letting out a puff of air through his nose, Mark disentangled himself from Jisung and rose to his feet with a groan. He twisted his body a couple of times to work out the knots that had formed in his spine and then reached out a hand to help his maknae.

“Come on,” he nudged, folding his fingers around the kid’s and levering him off the floor. “The others are all in the living room.”

He tried to pull Jisung towards the door but he wriggled free and retreated a couple of steps, sheepishly shaking his head and rubbing at the back of his neck without making eye contact.

“I don’t … I’d rather be alone.”

For some reason, he couldn’t stand the idea of being around the others. Every single one of them reeked of grief and fear. Even though his heart was black, it felt like just being in their presence made it even blacker.

But Mark snagged his hand once more and gave him another tug, this one stronger and more forceful even though his words were gentle and his expression was understanding.

“At times like this, it’s better not to be alone.”

Jisung didn’t know how to argue without sounding like a complete asshole so he simply allowed his hyung to lead him down the hallway and into the living room where even the air seemed to suddenly get a bit greyer.

The TV was on, some random drama playing in the background, but nobody was watching it.

Jaemin and Renjun were sitting on the couch, staring at the screen, but their eyes were unfocused. They were clearly residing in their own little worlds. Donghyuck was in the armchair, looking as if he would’ve fallen asleep if it weren’t for the pure misery that seemed to wrack his every pore.

Sungchan and Shotaro could be heard from the kitchen, pottering about and trying to figure out how to work the new microwave so they could cook some ramen, probably for the ones who were too depressed to make it themselves.

Jisung had noticed before that neither of them seemed to know what to do. They weren’t as familiar and friendly with Chenle as the others were and so maybe felt the need to be the stronger, more functioning members of the household.

Jeno was nowhere to be seen, but he was probably in the gym. Whenever he was stressed, he went to the gym. He would eventually show back up at the dorm, drenched in sweat and smelling of a high school locker room, but he wouldn’t talk to anyone.

No one would even know what to say.

“Kun-hyung and Ten-hyung should be taking off any minute,” Mark repeated to the room at large as he guided Jisung over to the empty couch and pulled him down at his side. “And Taeyong-hyung’s gone to the CEO’s office to try and find out what’s happening in terms of handling the media and so on.”

Nobody acknowledged that he’d even spoken. The drama answered for them as the main character burst into fits of unrealistic tears and collapsed to her knees as though the mere thought of her beloved boyfriend leaving her was enough to stop her heart.

As though there weren’t real problems happening in the real world to real people.

Jaemin seemed to be just as fed up of listening to her ugly sobbing because he lifted the remote and turned off the television set. And then the room was filled with a very loud silence that no one knew how to fill, or if they should even try.

The sheer heaviness of the atmosphere reminded Jisung of why he wasn’t much into socialising these days. He was already sick to his stomach enough as it was without the added stress of seeing his friends fall apart around him.

Sungchan and Shotaro had stopped making so much noise in the kitchen, probably sensing the awkwardness in the other room. Even Mark had given up trying to make conversation.

That was why nobody expected Donghyuck to suddenly start speaking.

“I love you, guys.”

It was so sudden and so out of the blue and so uncharacteristic that Jisung almost choked on his own saliva. He’d heard Donghyuck say such things a hundred times before but it had always been in jest or as an attempt to get a reaction of disgust.

The sincerity behind his words was both unnerving and concerning, and he seemed to realise just how shocked everybody was to hear him talk like that because he hastened to elaborate.

“I just mean … If anything happens … If I don’t get the chance to say it beforehand … I just wanted you to know.”

And only now did Jisung understand.

None of them had said a proper goodbye to Chenle when he’d left because there was no reason for anyone to believe that he wouldn’t be straight back in just a few days. They hadn’t told him they loved him, hadn’t left him with any parting messages to be proud of.

They had to live with the knowledge that, if the worst came to the worst, they’d already said their last words to him, and most of them couldn’t even remember what they’d been.

“I love you, too,” Jaemin muttered without looking up. “All of you.”

“Me, too,” Mark added.

“Me, too.” Renjun.

Jisung paused, looking around the room at each of them. It suddenly hit him that, unless he was going to be the first among them to die, he would have to go to at least one of their funerals at some point in the future. He would have to live in a world where they didn’t.

It was such a morbid and distressing thought but the idea of them not knowing how he felt or how grateful he was that they’d always taken such good care of him since he was barely in double digits was even scarier.

“Me, too,” he breathed.

From the kitchen, there came the distinct sounds of Shotaro and Sungchan beginning to make the ramen again. 

**09dys 12hrs 18min 02sec**


	11. The Unmasked Man

It was the yelling that woke Chenle, but it was the subject of the yelling that had him wriggling out from underneath his own jacket and clambering off the bed.

He’d been starting to lose track of how many days had gone past but he always knew there was going to be an argument. It was as sure as the sun rose in the morning and forced him to open his eyes against the glare that hit him straight in the face.

Funnily enough, antique prison cells didn’t have curtains.

Even if he hadn’t learned by now to recognise their individual voices, he would know which two were fighting because they were the same two who were always fighting: Xiaofei and the guy who seemed adamant about cutting off their captive’s finger.

“It’s been two fucking weeks!” Finger Guy shouted, and Chenle could envision him advancing on Xiaofei with his eyes blaring from behind his mask.

Although, why would they wear masks when they were only with each other?

They were probably right at the end of the passageway, well out of sight but the architecture and positioning of the solid stone walls ensured that their voices bounced and ricocheted and reverberated right through the bars of the cell door.

Chenle slid over and sank into a ball on the floor, trying to make himself as small and invisible as possible while still wanting to listen to what was going on. If he was going to die, he should know beforehand.

“You said they’d pay straight up!” the guy was still roaring. “But it’s been two fucking weeks and we’ve got jack-shit!”

Two weeks … It couldn’t have been two weeks. Could it? His company, his members, his friends – _Kun_ – had neglected to pay for two whole weeks? Did they have a plan or were they just giving up on him entirely?

No.

He shook himself. Kun wouldn’t do that. Kun wouldn’t let that happen. Kun would _never_ let that happen.

“So, what do you propose we do now, oh almighty leader of ours!”

That was a question Chenle was pretty interested in himself. Was this when he died? Was this when they strapped him down and tortured him to give his family incentive to pay? Was this when his semi-decent treatment came to an end?

Would Xiaofei really let them dismember him?

“I haven’t exactly done this before!” came the familiar voice of Chenle’s favourite captor, if it was possible to have such a thing.

This wasn’t Stockholm Syndrome, right?

“There’s no handbook on how to successfully ransom a fucking child!”

“He’s not a child!” Finger Guy shouted back. “You thinking like that is what’s making you incapable of doing what needs to be done! We made a threat! If we don’t follow through, how are they going to take us seriously?”

“Because it was supposed to be just a threat!” Xiaofei retorted, and Chenle bit his lip. “She was supposed to pay! It was never supposed to go this far! We were never supposed to have to hurt him!”

A shiver ran down Chenle’s spine at his words. He knew exactly who the ‘she’ they were talking about was. There was only one person it could be. Of course, he wasn’t surprised that ‘she’ hadn’t paid a single bill towards his release.

He _was_ surprised to hear the uncertainty and insecurity in Xiaofei’s voice.

They were inexperienced. They’d never done this before. They’d obviously planned it, probably for months, since the entire abduction process had gone off without a hitch but now that things were starting to derail, they were lost.

Or, at least, Xiaofei was lost. This other guy seemed to know exactly where he was, and that ‘where’ included torture.

“We did this for a reason! All of us agreed that we would go however far we needed to make that bitch pay for what she did! And now that you’re realising it’s not all fluffy lambs and bunny rabbits, you want to pull out?”

“I didn’t say I wanted to pull out! I just don’t want to cut up a kid who’s done nothing wrong!”

“You were perfectly happy to string him up and burn him alive when we came up with the idea!”

Chenle flinched so violently that he cracked his head against the wall behind him, but he was too terrified to feel the pain. He’d thought Xiaofei was different. He’d thought Xiaofei had a heart.

“My wife was dead!” the man with no heart screamed back, and there was a crack in his voice. Emotion. Maybe not so heartless anymore. “I would’ve said anything to make myself feel better!”

“So what?” came the furious response. “Is she any less dead now than she was back then? She still suffocated on that factory floor because the doors were fucking locked!”

“Don’t! I still want to do this! I still want her to suffer but he’s a human being and he had nothing to do with what she did! I won’t let you make him pay for her crimes!”

“You know what? If you don’t have the stomach for this then I’ll do it myself!”

“Yun!”

Chenle was locked in a casing of shock so strong that it took him far too much time to realise that the footsteps he could hear echoing off the walls were getting closer and not further away.

Suppressing a shriek of terror, he jolted his numbed body back into action. Half crawling, half running, he scrambled across the cell and tumbled none-too-graciously onto the bed as if he could somehow pretend to be asleep when his chest was heaving and his shoulders were trembling.

Maybe if they saw he wasn’t awake … they wouldn’t torture him? Maybe if they didn’t know he’d been listening to every word, had found out that Xiaofei had a wife who’d died in that horrible fire and that this other guy was called Yun, they would have one less reason to do whatever it was they were about to do.

The all-too-familiar shriek of the door being unlocked made him realise all of that was just wishful – and delusional – thinking.

“Up!” came the gruff order, and Chenle shot off the mattress to press his back against the wall before he could be dragged.

He looked at the huge hulking man who was advancing on him, one hammy hand reaching out with every intention of closing around his upper arm and breaking his bones clean in two, and he said the first thing he could think of.

“I need to use the bathroom.”

The tremor in his voice would have been embarrassing if his mind wasn’t repeating the same thing on a loop.

Since he’d learned they wanted his mother involved in this, he’d known it had to be related in some way to all the horrible things she’d done to completely innocent people. Of course, she’d never intended to kill anyone but she hadn’t exactly shown any remorse either.

Now he had it confirmed: at least one of his kidnappers had lost someone in that fire. Maybe they all had. That was probably how they’d met and why they’d come up with a plan as twisted and sadistic as this.

Grief could do that to a person, could turn them into something unrecognisable. Angry. Vengeful. Murderous.

Chenle had never exactly felt safe here but now … Now he knew for certain that unless these people knew how little he and his mother cared for each other, he was most likely going to die in an attempt to make her feel the pain her victims had felt.

The only thing he could do now was try to deny the inevitable.

“For fuck’s sake,” Yun cursed under his breath, looking as if he wanted nothing more than to take a hammer to Chenle’s skull.

He seemed to decide against it, however, because he span on his studded heel and marched straight out of the cell, reaching for something that was hanging on the passageway wall.

“You should be able to put it on yourself by now,” he growled, tossing the chain none too gently at Chenle’s feet. “Thirty seconds or I do it myself.”

There was no way Chenle was giving the monster a reason to touch him. He folded his legs beneath him and seated himself on the dusted ground without uttering a word of protest or sparing a second of hesitation.

They’d only started letting him do this a couple of days ago and he much preferred it to having to use a bucket to go to the bathroom. Apparently, they preferred it, too, and he could see why.

The chain was old, rusty and made a horrific jangling noise every time it came into contact with the ground. It was probably left behind when whoever used to live in this town abandoned it.

He tugged the leg of his jeans as far down over his ankle as it would go. He’d learned from experience that the thing could rub really painfully if he didn’t provide his skin with enough padding.

His hands were shaking.

He couldn’t stop thinking about what was going to happen when his stalling time ran out.

Was there any possibility he could make a run for it once he was outside? If he didn’t fasten the chain properly, he might be able to slip out of it and take off. Each of these pigs carried guns but he was small. He wasn’t an easy target.

The cuff of the shackle closed around his ankle, he slid the pin through to seal it shut and then reached for the padlock. Maybe … Maybe he wouldn’t lock it properly. Maybe …

“You know I’m gonna check that as soon as you’re done so if you’re trying to do what I think you’re trying to do, I’d seriously reconsider.”

Okay, so the guy was a kidnapper, a wannabe torturer, a potential murderer and now a mind-reader, too.

Desperately trying not to think about what awaited him no matter how long he tried to delay it, he clicked the padlock shut around the head of the pin and effectively leashed himself to his captor.

He stayed on the ground while Yun strode over and checked the chain. As he was tugging on the metal links to be sure they wouldn’t come free, his jacket rode up a little and Chenle caught sight of the firearm tucked into his belt.

Even if he could grab it, he wouldn’t be able to run with this thing on his leg. Even if he could bring himself to kill one man, there were half a dozen more waiting outside. Was it better to go down fighting than let himself be murdered on camera?

Yun grabbed his elbow, fingernails digging in far too deep and possibly even puncturing his skin through his shirt as he dragged the kid to his chained feet and shoved him out of the cell.

“Walk.”

As if he didn’t already know what he was supposed to do.

He stooped to pick up the chain. It was a lot easier to carry some of it instead of trying to drag it along behind him. That was just clunky and uncomfortable and made a series of very unpleasant noises. Yun was holding the other end anyway.

As he emerged from his seemingly permanent residence, he glanced to the right and spotted Xiaofei – he assumed it was Xiaofei from the height and build since he had his mask on – leaning against the wall, staring at the ground.

And, oh, how badly Chenle wanted to believe that he was listening in, protecting him, making sure that Yun wasn’t going to do anything that would bring him harm. But after what had just been said, he wasn’t sure that was the truth anymore.

“I said, walk!”

The slap to the side of his head brought him to his senses and he made his way towards the mouth of the passageway, having to limp slightly to handle the weight of the chain on his ankle.

There were a series of overgrown bushes behind the building that apparently had been assigned for this purpose and this purpose alone. It was no use him trying to look around for any landmarks because, with the way they literally kept him on a short leash, he didn’t get to see any.

He still didn’t know where he was.

He reached the bushes and paused, nervously glancing over his shoulder to see Yun standing there with the end of the chain in one hand and an unlit cigarette in the other. Even though the vast majority of his face was concealed, his eyes were expectant. Waiting.

This was the part Chenle hated the most.

“Could you …” he started, swallowing the lump lodged in his throat. “Turn around? Please?”

Yun scoffed but he did as he was asked. It made sense that he wasn’t worried. Chenle wasn’t going anywhere and it wasn’t like he knew where there was to go even if he could.

Only when he was sure that Yun’s back was turned did he even start what he’d come here to do.

Tears pricked his eyes but he blinked them away. This was not an appropriate place to cry. Even if he was certain that his finger was about to be cut off and sent to his family, even if he knew that his next few moments were going to be filled with pain.

Behind him, he could hear the click of Yun’s cigarette lighter and smell the nicotine that wafted with the smoke.

Maybe stalling was a bad idea after all. The anticipation and trepidation was just making everything so much worse. If he was going to be hurt then surely it was better to get it over and done with.

He finished up and turned around.

And froze.

Yun still had his back turned, cigarette glowing between his fingers as he brought it to his lips and expelled a column of ash into the air, but he’d removed his balaclava.

As Chenle watched, glued to the spot and incapable of drawing a full breath, the unmasked man turned his head to look at something to his left and exposed the entire side of his face.

Chenle should look away. He really should. If Yun caught him watching, he would shoot him dead on the spot. There was no way he would give him the same chance that Xiaofei had.

Look away. Look away before he notices. Look away. Look away right now.

Yun turned around.

“What you think you’re staring at?” he snapped, little wisps of ash escaping from between his lips every time he formed a new syllable.

Chenle dropped his eyes at once, bowing his head until his neck was bent almost ninety degrees and he could see absolutely nothing other than Ten’s shoes on his feet.

He’d forgotten he was still wearing Ten’s shoes.

“Fuck!”

He jumped out of his skin, bringing both hands up to his chest in a defensive reflex and screwing his eyes as tightly shut as they could possibly go without ripping his face in half.

Yun had just realised his blunder.

“FUCK!”

There was a stomp of furious feet on grass, a rustle of fabric and then a click. An unmistakable click. A click that Chenle had only ever heard before on a TV screen.

And against his better judgement, he looked up.

Yun hadn’t bothered to lower his mask because what was the point now that the captive had seen him? He was no longer holding his cigarette, the embers fizzling out on the ground a few inches away, but the empty space in his hand had been filled with a gun.

A gun that was pointed directly at Chenle’s head.

“No …” he whispered, knees going weak as he stared straight down the barrel of the weapon that was going to take his life. “Please …”

“Shut up!” Yun roared, advancing several steps and dropping the chain so that he could bring his hand up to steady the other. “Just shut the fuck up!”

Chenle’s legs gave out and he crumpled like tissue paper, fists curling into the grass beneath him as his vision went blurry and his heart threatened to explode inside his chest.

“I won’t tell …” he whispered pleadingly. “I … I won’t tell … Please … I won’t say anything …”

“JUST SHUT UP!” came the resulting bellow, so loud that Chenle felt it in his bones and it drew a hideous whimper of terror from deep within his throat.

Yun was trembling. Yun had most definitely never killed before. That didn’t mean that Yun wasn’t going to kill now, though. Yun was already halfway there. One flicker of his index finger and Chenle’s brain would be obliterated.

He suddenly wished he was going back inside to be tortured.

“Just shut up …” Yun repeated, closing the gap between perpetrator and victim and pressing the sleek silver ring against Chenle’s forehead. “I’ll make it quick.”

Of all the words in the world, in both language that Chenle could speak, he couldn’t find a single one to use in this moment. He couldn’t think clearly. He couldn’t come up with anything that would get him out of this.

He couldn’t think of anything except Kun, and how hard he would cry at the funeral.

“Please …”

Gunshots aren’t nearly as loud in the movies.

**14dys 13hrs 06min 52sec**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well ... So that happened ...


	12. Emotions Under Control

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy new year, guys! So sorry for the wait but real life caught up with me

Ten woke up with the world’s worst pain in his neck and back, telling him that – not for the first time this week – he’d fallen asleep slumped over the table with his laptop still open in front of him.

Gingerly, he sat up, massaging his protesting spinal cord and wincing at the pops that ricocheted through his joints. His computer had long since shut down and Ten couldn’t exactly blame it because he felt the same way.

Kun was exactly where he’d been the last time they’d looked at each other: on the opposite side of the table with his own laptop slowly draining the life from his eyes. His face was bathed in the ghostly white glow of the screen light and his fingers were still tapping away at the keys as if they’d actually had a break in the last twelve hours.

“You haven’t slept, have you?” Ten probed even though he knew the answer.

Kun didn’t even look up from his work, “No.”

“Have you eaten?”

“No.”

As Ten watched, his best friend picked up his phone and dialled whatever number he’d managed to obtain from the almighty powers of the internet. He held the device to his ear and listened to it ring, and Ten decided he’d had enough.

He understood all too well just how dire the situation was and he understood that Kun needed to be doing something that could possibly be considered helpful in order to stop himself from losing his mind, but not at the cost of his own health.

Since they’d arrived in Beijing, all they’d been doing was research. Looking up and tracking down the victims of that horrible fire and trying to get a number through which they could contact them or their families.

The police were doing the same thing much more efficiently and much more professionally and they were amateurs who had no idea what they were doing.

More people had hung up on them than they had agreed to answer their queries but it was seriously difficult to respond well to the question, “Hey, I’m terribly sorry about the loss of your family member in that completely avoidable fire but do you happen to have a nineteen-year-old kid locked up in your basement?” 

There was a very real possibility that Kun was going to get himself a restraining order but, again, it all came down to coping. This was what he needed to do to keep his emotions under control.

Still rubbing his eyes to get the sleep crystals free, Ten sidled down the hallway towards the kitchen, socked feet shuffling exhaustedly against the floor.

He would make some ramen and a cup of coffee – decaf, of course – and set it down beside Kun with the request to please just try to swallow something. It probably wouldn’t work and the coffee would most likely go cold before a drop could be drunk, but this was what Ten needed to do to keep his emotions under control.

In his sleep-deprived and semi-conscious state, his mind got confused between the two voices filtering from either end of the hallway and that was why he walked into the kitchen to find Peng Fei whispering into the phone without even realising he was on a call.

He paused at the sight of the private detective’s back, broad shoulders hunched and muscles flexing as he rubbed a finger over his eyebrow, and he was just about to back right out of the room when he heard the subject of the conversation.

“And the body’s impossible to identify without dental records?”

Every one of Ten's pores went cold at that simple question. His lungs froze up, his heart turned to ice and even the blood solidified in his veins.

“How long’s it going to take, do you think?”

It’s not … Right? It’s just that … It couldn’t be …

“Damn it …” Peng Fei sighed as though he’d just heard news of an investment gone bad rather than the appearance of corpse that was apparently so mashed and mangled it couldn’t be recognised for what it was. “No, I’m not going to subject them to that if they won’t be able to ID it anyway.”

It’s not real. It’s not real. It’s not real. It’s not real.

It’s somebody else. Please, God, let it be somebody else. Ten didn’t even care if he was going to hell for thinking it but it _had_ to be somebody else.

They were supposed to keep him alive.

They weren’t supposed to kill him.

He wasn’t supposed to die.

“Alright, keep me updated.”

It wasn’t supposed to end this way.

“Yeah, he’s still just a kid. All we can do is hope, right?”

They were supposed to get him back.

“Thanks, man.”

Peng Fei ended the call, braced both hands against the kitchen counter and let out a long, long breath. For several seconds, he just stood there like a statue of drying cement while Ten had already turned to concrete.

It’s not real. It’s not real. It’s not real.

He was stuck on a loop, repeating the same mantra in his head because that was the only way he knew how to handle this. If he moved a single muscle, took a single step, let out a single breath, the world would come crashing down around him.

Peng Fei finally seemed to sense that he wasn’t alone and glanced over his shoulder.

Their eyes locked.

“Ten …” he started, but Ten was quicker.

“No,” he growled out, holding up his hands to indicate that the man before him was not allowed to take another step or speak another word. “No.”

It’s not real. It’s not real. It’s not real. 

His voice broke.

“Please don’t say it.”

“Okay,” Peng Fei nodded, still without advancing on the boy in denial. “But not saying it doesn’t make it any less true.”

It’s not real. It’s not real.

He was still asleep. That was it. He was still slumped over the table with his face in his arms and his computer’s battery slowly draining while he drooled onto the placemat. He was still asleep and this was just one very grotesque – very vivid – nightmare.

“It might not be him,” Peng Fei continued despite Ten’s protests. “They still have to make a positive identification, but –”

“Why do they think it’s him?” Ten interrupted as the hand he was holding up started to tremble and his shoulders started to shake. “It could be anyone so why … Why do they think it’s him?”

“Because the van that was seen dumping the body is registered under the name of a man who lost his wife in the Guilin fire.”

It’s not real.

“And …” He coughed. As though that would make the pain in his chest and the tightness in his throat go away. “And why can’t they identify it?”

Peng Fei lifted his chin slightly, “Ten, I don’t think you want to know.”

“No, I do. I … I do …”

If that cadaver really was Chenle – the nineteen-year-old boy who’d already suffered enough for one lifetime – then Ten was going to have to be the one to tell Kun because he would be damned if he let anybody else do it.

And Kun would ask questions. Kun would want to know everything. So, even though the very last thing Ten wanted to hear right now was how that child had died, he needed to ask. For Kun.

“It was pulled out of the sea,” Peng Fei explained, his voice still even and calm as if he’d done this a hundred times before. Maybe he had. “It looks like it’s been there a couple of days. And it was burned.”

Very slowly, Ten lowered his hand.

It certainly felt real now.

“He …” Why was he still talking? Why was his mouth moving without his permission? Why couldn’t he even feel his mouth? Why couldn’t he feel anything? “He’s just … a little kid … He’s just a little kid.”

He was going to collapse. He could feel the weakness in his ankles spreading to his knees and then to his hips and sooner or later, it would envelop his whole spine and he would have no bones left with which to keep standing.

He should sit down. Save himself the fall. But he couldn’t move. There was a chair right in front of him. He could reach it, pull it towards him, sit down and be safe. But somehow it was too far away.

“He’s just a little kid …”

“Ten!”

No … No, Kun. Not now. He couldn’t deal with that man right now. He couldn’t look at him, knowing that the boy he’d adopted might very well be dead and that all their greatest fears had become reality.

“Ten! Ten, he’s calling!”

The kitchen was spinning ever so slightly. Like he was on a very lethargic merry-go-round. The air was thick, too. Almost too thick to breathe through his nose. He tried to open his mouth. But he couldn’t feel anything.

“Tell me what to do!”

Why was Kun sounding so panicked? He didn’t know yet. He had nothing to be panicking over. Whatever it was that had him in such a state was going to feel like a papercut compared to the bombshell Ten was going to have to drop sooner or later.

Then Kun barrelled past him, colliding clumsily with his left shoulder as he staggered over the threshold. He wasn’t even talking to Ten anymore. He was talking to Peng Fei.

And his phone was ringing.

Peng Fei snatched it from him and set it down on the kitchen counter, positioning himself so that he and Kun were on either side of the large marble structure and the buzzing device was between them like a bomb about to go off.

“Be calm,” Peng Fei was saying, and there was a kind of deadly seriousness in his eyes that would’ve made Ten shiver if he wasn’t still so numb. “That’s the most important thing. Do not let them hear how scared you are. It gives them the advantage. Keep mentioning Chenle by name. Ask to hear his voice and don’t answer any questions until you do. Whatever you do, try and keep him on the line for as long as possible.”

Ten finally snapped out of his reverie and lurched forwards. He caught the briefest glimpse of Chenle’s contact photo on the phone screen before Kun reached out to answer the call.

The following second was the longest second of Ten’s life. It hung in the air, teetering on the edge of the precipice, threatening to fall at any moment. At the slightest touch or the softest breath.

Kun broke it as soon as he wavered out the word, “Hello?”

“Took you long enough,” came the voice from the other end of the line, and the vaguest aura of confusion glanced across Kun’s face.

He grabbed for the stack of post-it notes they kept beside the kettle and scribbled down a few chicken scratches. Ten wasn’t too good at reading Chinese but, from what he could comprehend of Kun’s handwriting, it said, _Not the same guy._

Peng Fei was doing something with his own phone, typing and tapping away at the screen with one hand while gesturing for Kun to keep talking with the other. It occurred to Ten that maybe he was trying to trace Chenle’s mobile through GPS now that the device had been turned on for the first time in two weeks.

“I’m sorry,” Kun apologised quickly, repeatedly checking with Peng Fei to confirm that he was saying the right things. “I didn’t hear the phone ringing.”

As if he hadn’t been clutching the thing like a lifeline, just waiting for the moment when the screen lit up and the smooth surface hummed with vibrations.

“You really don’t seem to care about this kid very much,” the man continued. He sounded angry. “We provided you with a set of very clear instructions and you failed to hold up your end of the deal. And the brat’s mother won’t even answer the phone.”

Kun’s expression toughened. His jaw began to bulge.

He was angry, too, now.

“I have no control over what she does,” he ground out in response. “But I can assure you that we’re still willing to make a transaction. It just wasn’t possible for us to acquire that much money at such short notice. If you let me speak to Chenle –”

“You don’t get to speak to him,” the voice interjected, and Ten’s stomach flipped. “The circumstances have changed.”

He was going to be sick. He was actually going to be sick.

They weren’t letting them speak to Chenle because Chenle wasn’t there. They didn’t have him anymore. They’d burned his body and flung him in the sea and now he was lying on some cold metal slab in a mortuary.

He was dead. They’d screwed up and they knew it. That was why they were now trying to make a different deal.

Ten’s fingers reached out instinctively, curling into Kun’s sleeve and cementing themselves there permanently. He couldn’t get his tongue to operate, didn’t have the strength to say the words that needed to be said. He could only hold on.

Peng Fei mouthed something to Kun that Ten couldn’t decipher but, apparently, Kun could because his next words held more strength than all the previous ones before.

“If I don’t have proof that Chenle’s okay, there’s no reason for me to keep talking to you.”

There was a long pause in which Ten surely wasn’t the only one holding his breath. Even Peng Fei had stopped typing to listen to what was going to come next.

A couple of muffled sounds emanated from the speakers, as though the kidnapper was covering the microphone with his finger. 

And then,

“Hello?”

That single word alone sent Ten to his knees on the hard kitchen tiled floor, tears finally spilling over as he gasped up at the ceiling and tried not to audibly sob.

He’d been so sure. He’d already been halfway to acceptance, but that was Chenle’s voice. It was cracked and broken and hoarse, like he’d been crying for hours on end, but it was him.

“Lele …” Kun gasped out, breath hitching as he fought his own wave of emotion. “Are you okay?”

“I …” A stifled hiccup. He was crying right now. “I don’t know.”

Kun took a breath, preparing for another question, but before he could even get out the first syllable, the phone exchanged hands once more.

“There.” The kidnapper was back. “You heard him. He’s fine.”

He certainly didn’t sound fine. He sounded sad and scared and, dare Ten say it, broken. Sure, he was alive, but by no means was he ‘fine’.

Ten clambered to his feet, having to use the counter for support as his knees continued to wobble threateningly beneath his weight. Kun was frantically scrubbing at the moisture in his eyes and trying to clear his throat without being heard through the line.

“Now let me make this clear to you,” the man huffed threateningly. “Right now, I am in control of this situation but if you aren’t willing to cooperate with me then that’s going to change. And trust me when I say that you do not want that to happen.”

They both looked to Peng Fei for guidance but he just kept making that same motion with his hand, prompting Kun to keep doing whatever he was doing.

How long did it take to trace a GPS?

“The kid doesn’t have a scratch on him.” Was that true? “But if I pass him over to the guy who wants him, he will. And a lot more.”

Guy? There was a guy? A guy who _wanted_ Chenle? Like, as an object? For himself? Or so that he could take hold of the operation and conduct things his way?

“The only way you can prevent that is if you get the boy’s mother to pay the fucking ransom. I don’t care what you have to say to her or if you have to steal it from her own purse, but this is your last chance.”

That did not sound good. At all.

“So answer me honestly, Kun. Can you get the bitch to pay within the next twenty-four hours?”

Ten’s gaze snapped from Kun’s face to Peng Fei’s, waiting for somebody to make the first move and give this guy the answer he was demanding.

Did they lie? Did they say there was no chance they could get Chenle’s psychotic, narcissistic, criminally negligent monster of a mother to sign over her entire net worth in a single day? Would this guy be able to tell they weren’t telling the truth?

If they didn’t give the correct answer then what was going to happen to Chenle?

“Hey! If you’re not gonna speak up then this ends here and now!”

“We need more time,” Kun spewed in a panic. “If you know anything about her then you’ll know that she’s a twisted psychopath. She won’t be that easy to convince. If you just give us some more time then we might be able to gather the money ourselves, but –”

They heard a sigh of resignation.

Ten couldn’t help thinking that Kun had just failed the test.

“Jesus …” came the reply at last. It held no warmth and not even any anger anymore. It was kind of sad. “Just so you know, you really failed this kid. You had your chance to do this the easy way and you fucked it up.”

Wait … What?

“Hang on –” Kun blurted.

“Whatever happens next is on you.”

The line went dead and the three of them were left with the drone of the dial tone and the image of Chenle’s grinning face smiling up at them from the screen.

What had they just done?

Had they just signed their boy’s death warrant?

These people were so determined to make his mother pay. That was why they wanted to get hold of her but, of course, she wasn’t answering so they were the ones who had to listen to the threats and the terrified child.

Something had happened. Something had changed. Maybe the corpse had something to do with it, but the situation was different now. They sounded more desperate, like they were running against some kind of clock.

Maybe they knew the police were getting closer to tracking them down.

And now they were signing off and handing Chenle over to … Who? Their boss? Some other dude with a grudge against the kid’s mother? They were giving up and passing him on like some kind of time bomb.

And apparently, this guy was a lot worse. That could be why they were bowing to his superiority. Because they knew that he could do whatever it was that they couldn’t.

Why did that sound so petrifying?

Peng Fei raised his head. There was a hint of a spark in his eye even if the rest of his face was aged by frown lines.

“I’ve got a location.”

Why didn’t that sound at all reassuring? 

**18dys 15hrs 56min 11sec**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Keep telling me what you think will happen and what you want to happen. It helps me figure out where I'm going with this story


	13. Guilt And Humanity

_He fell right in front of him, one huge tree-trunk of a man suddenly stiffening all over, eyes wide with shock before that twisted evil light went out and he pitched forwards. The gun was still in his hand._

_Chenle scrambled out of the way, heels digging into the overgrown grass beneath his feet as he frantically tried to put as much distance between him and Yun’s corpse as possible._

_The tears were frozen on his face, his ears were ringing. The only sound he could hear was his own heart thundering against the inside of his ribs. His chest was too tight to breathe. He could only gasp for air and try not to pass out._

_Yun’s eyes were still open. Blank. Staring. Right at him, as though they were boring into his soul, blaming him for their death. The colour in his cheeks was draining away as Chenle watched without the ability to just_ stop _watching._

_Blood was pooling beneath his face, lapping out of his skull and painting the blades of grass a deep dark crimson. The soil soaked it up, allowing the chemicals that had – just seconds previously – been pumping through Yun’s veins to seep through the granules of dirt like water in a sponge._

_How much blood was there in one body? Why wasn’t it stopping? He was already dead. He couldn’t still be bleeding._

_The eyes were still staring. They were fixed on him. Accusing him, cursing him, ensuring for certain that Chenle was never going to forget the sight of them. Glassy, glazed, kind of shiny._

_Chenle couldn’t stop looking at them._

_“G-Get up,” came the stammer in his ear just before there was a hand on his elbow and he was being dragged upwards. “Get up, Chenle!”_

_His legs weren’t working. He couldn’t feel anything below his waist. He couldn’t feel anything that wasn’t his heart in his throat. His ears were filled with the long and persistent chiming of bells and everything else was under water._

_Yun was dead. There was a dead body in front of him. A_ dead body. _A mother’s child. A human being. A living, breathing person who was no longer breathing at all. Who was no longer a person at all._

_“Please, Chenle!”_

_Xiaofei wrapped both arms around his waist and practically lifted him off the ground, hauling him and the six-foot chain that was still attached to his ankle across the grass, back towards the jail._

_Chenle could feel him shaking. He could feel the short, sharp puffs of air his captor – his saviour – was making. He could feel the cool steel of the gun against his chest. Not the barrel. Not digging in. Not threatening to shoot him. Just sitting there in Xiaofei’s clammy palm._

_He wondered if that gun had killed before, if it’d known what it was doing or if it was just obeying the commands of its master. Maybe the master hadn’t known what he was doing either._

_Because with the way Xiaofei was trembling, the way his voice was cracked and his breathing was harsh, Chenle knew he’d never killed before._

_The sensation returned to his legs a couple of seconds later and he was able to take at least some of his weight, stumbling and staggering along with Xiaofei as the chain clattered and clanged against the floor of the prison._

_He hadn’t even realised the light had gone out, the sun had disappeared and the greenery was no longer there. He hadn’t even realised he couldn’t see Yun’s body anymore because the image of those lifeless eyes was still right in front of him._

Chenle woke up.

For what was maybe ten or fifteen minutes, he didn’t move a single muscle. He just lay there, curled up on his side with his jacket draped over him, and stared at the opposite wall without really seeing it.

He wasn’t sure if he could call the dreams ‘nightmares’ anymore. He no longer awoke drenched in sweat with his lungs made of cement and his throat filled with dust as he choked and gasped until he almost passed out again.

Now he just … woke up, and yet it never felt like it. Those eyes were always there. Always in the back of his head, ready to trickle through the protective walls he’d been trying to put up between him and them.

It’d been … four, maybe five days – he’d stopped counting sunrises – since he’d watched another human die because of him. Because he hadn’t possessed the willpower to just turn away while he had the chance. If Yun hadn’t caught him looking, he never would’ve tried to kill him and then Xiaofei never would’ve had to pull the trigger.

Chenle had cried enough. At least three quarters of his time since that moment had been filled with red eyes and a sore head and tearstains on his jacket. It felt strange to cry for somebody who’d been trying to murder him, who’d threatened to torture him.

Maybe he wasn’t crying for Yun. Maybe he was crying for himself. Maybe it was relief that the scariest of his kidnappers was no longer here to hurt him. Maybe it was the trauma of watching all that blood draining into the grass.

Either way, it didn’t matter anymore. He’d decided last night. No more crying.

He’d heard Kun’s voice. Even if it had just been for a second, he’d heard it and it’d felt like sunshine through the rain. They were still looking for him. Kun was still looking, hadn’t given up even after all this time, was doing whatever he could to get him back.

So no more crying.

Because crying made him tired.

And he was going to need his energy for whatever came next.

There had been a lot of arguing amongst his captors since Yun was executed. More often than not, that arguing had escalated into yelling and Chenle had even heard a couple of punches being thrown.

He would’ve been afraid for what that meant for him. Of course, they were going to freak out. They weren’t professionals. They were amateurs and one of their strongest personalities had just been murdered by another.

He would’ve been afraid if he didn’t know for a fact that Xiaofei wouldn’t let anything happen to him. He’d been willing to kill his own colleague to save him whatever the reason may be. Perhaps his guilt had finally gotten the better of him.

So when he heard the footsteps approaching from down the passageway and the screeching scrape of the bolt echoed off the stone walls, he didn’t cringe away in fear. He didn’t even look at who it was.

He wasn’t scared anymore. Not now that he knew Xiaofei was watching out for him and Kun hadn’t ever and wouldn’t ever stop searching until he was found.

“Get up,” came the familiar voice from the doorway. “It’s time to go.”

Chenle raised his head and levelled Xiaofei with a disinterested expression, “Where?”

“Just get up,” Xiaofei repeated, and he sounded truly exhausted. He’d put his mask back on but Chenle knew the corners of his mouth were turned down in a frown. “I don’t want to have to point a gun at you.”

What had happened to the scary faceless figure who’d had no problem waving a firearm in his face almost three weeks ago? Was this how sincerely he regretted his actions? That he wasn’t even bothering to seem frightening anymore?

Chenle sat up and swung his legs off the edge of the bed, but he didn’t stand. He wasn’t going to do anything until he knew where they were supposed to be going and why.

“Is this when I get to go home?” he asked coldly, trying to play into Xiaofei’s humanity. “Or is this when you take me out back and shoot me?”

Xiaofei looked up sharply and a flash of anger glanced across his eyes at the insubordination. Chenle didn’t even flinch. There was something about Xiaofei. Maybe he was thinking about his wife – the one who’d died because of Chenle’s mother – but he had a heart, and a big one at that.

Maybe there was a chance … If Chenle made him feel guilty enough, he would just let him go.

Then, from the end of the passageway, somebody started yelling.

“XIAOFEI! WE NEED TO MOVE NOW!”

And just like that, Chenle lost the upper hand.

Without giving a response, without waiting for a reaction, Xiaofei crossed the cell in two strides and wrenched the captive off the bed with a bruising grip on his bicep. Chenle didn’t even have time to let out more than a surprised yelp before he was being dragged out of the building.

“Wait –” he tried, but it was no use. Xiaofei was too strong.

He tried digging his heels in, tried holding onto something. His earlier sentiment about not allowing himself to feel fear was starting to crumble.

“Please just cooperate,” Xiaofei whispered in his ear as he was hauled towards the open doors in the back of the van that was waiting. “Or they’ll make me tie you up.”

By ‘they’, he must’ve meant the other kidnappers, all of whom were either climbing into the van’s front seats or leaping into their own vehicles. Their masks were still on as well so at least Chenle knew he wasn’t about to be killed.

“Where are we going?” he cried out, and his voice came out a lot shriller than he’d intended. “I don’t … Where are we going?”

Somehow, it didn’t feel like they were heading towards the exchange point. There was a lot more panic and urgency. Then he was shoved in the back of the van and the sunlight was shut out with the slam of the doors.

Xiaofei pushed him into the corner and he slid obediently down onto the floor, looping his arms around his knees. The sense of déjà vu was paralyzingly strong and he couldn’t help but think back to the night he was taken.

He wanted to believe that he was much less scared now than he was then but now he wasn’t so sure. He didn’t know where he was going, why they were suddenly moving him and what their intentions were.

The engine hummed to life, the entire van trembling a little with the growl of the motor, and Xiaofei sagged against the wall. Chenle watched as the man reached the floor with a thump, sitting directly opposite him now, and pulled off his mask.

His hair looked greyer. His face looked older. His eyes looked haunted.

“Where are we going?” Chenle whispered, too afraid to raise his voice for fear that it would crack and reveal just how terrified he really was.

He did not expect Xiaofei to look him straight in the eye and say what he said next.

“I really am sorry, Chenle.”

It was so bizarre. He’d been kidnapped, held hostage for almost three weeks, ransomed for more money than it was possible to own, threatened with torture and dismemberment, almost been shot in the face and then had watched a man’s life end right before his eyes, and yet the person who’d caused all of it was now apologising.

“You have a kid, don’t you?” Chenle murmured before he could stop himself, knowing he’d hit the mark when Xiaofei’s eyes suddenly started to water. “Same age as me?”

“A little younger,” the man admitted.

“That’s why you won’t let them hurt me.” It wasn’t a question anymore. “Because I remind you of your kid.”

The circumstances were so absurd. He sat there in a moving van, unaware of his destination or even how long he had left to live, having a heart-to-heart with the man who’d abducted him.

“Were you going to give your share of the ransom money to them?”

Xiaofei wasn’t looking at him anymore. He just glared at the balaclava in his hands, roughened thumbs toying with the frayed threads. He didn’t just look guilty anymore. He looked ashamed.

“I know how she treated you,” he said at last. “Your mother. I know she made your childhood hell. I could see it in your eyes when you told me she wasn’t going to pay.”

In spite of everything, Chenle smirked, “Then why take me at all if you knew it would be about as painful for her as a massage?”

“Because it was never meant to be about you,” Xiaofei murmured. “The most important thing to her is her business, her money and her reputation. We knew she wouldn’t cough up for you but she’d have no choice if we told the whole world that we had you. If she didn’t, everyone would know what a fraud she was.”

They were smarter than Chenle had given them credit for. He wasn’t so much a hostage as he was a tool in this warped operation. He’d known they were using him to get to his mother but not in the way he’d thought.

“Except she didn’t pay …” Chenle chipped in with a nod of understanding. “The only way you could communicate with her was either through the media or through my brother and that wasn’t working either. So …”

He trailed off, watching Xiaofei expectantly, waiting for his theory to be finished for him.

That look of shame was back in Xiaofei’s eyes.

“You’re not letting me go, are you?”

He hadn’t expected to be released anyway but watching the man in front of him slowly shake his head cemented the belief in his gut.

“And we’re not on our way to see Kun and get the money, are we?”

Xiaofei finally met his eye, “I really am –”

“Yeah,” Chenle interrupted before he could hear that word again. “You’re sorry but I think I deserve a little more than that. So, if you’re not going to let me go back and see my family – who I’ve only been able to say three words to since you _kidnapped_ me – then the least you can do is tell me where we’re going because if I’m going to die then …”

“You’re not going to die,” Xiaofei mumbled as he reached up to rake his fingers through his hair. “There’s a guy … He’s part of an underground network and he … he’s going to buy you off us.”

Chenle supposed he was scared but he just didn’t feel it. For whatever reason, his heartrate didn’t jump and his breathing didn’t hitch and his chest didn’t feel tight like it had on so many other occasions.

He merely arched an eyebrow and repeated, “Buy me?”

Like an object. A possession. A product. Like he wasn’t even human anymore.

“I don’t know for certain,” Xiaofei continued. “But I imagine he’ll pick up where we left off. Only, he’ll do it better.”

“You mean the ransom?”

“Yeah …”

So still not dying then. At least that was something. And if this guy was supposedly going to do the job ‘better’ then maybe he wouldn’t have to stay long before he got to go home. Although, he wasn’t sure how you could be a ‘better’ hostage taker.

And then he wondered why the hell he was trying to look on the bright side of a very, very dark situation.

“If it was up to me, this wouldn’t be happening. I don’t want you to get hurt. But I’m not the only one involved in this and I was outnumbered. Funnily enough, when you kill your partner in crime, it makes you a little less trustworthy.”

“You expect me to feel sorry for you?”

Because, and this was perhaps scarier than the idea of being passed over to a known criminal, he did. He did feel sorry for Xiaofei and he knew that he shouldn’t, but he almost couldn’t help it.

The guy seemed so shutdown and hopeless, and it wasn’t like he’d been planning for this to happen. Yun probably appeared in his nightmares twice as much as he appeared in Chenle’s. 

“They already accepted the money,” Xiaofei continued, pointedly ignoring Chenle’s harsh quip. “If we don’t hand you over then this guy’s just going to track you down and take you anyway. At least, this way, I get to look out for you.”

Chenle glanced up, both brows furrowed in the centre of his forehead.

“You’re coming with me?”

He would’ve thought Xiaofei would get as far away as possible the first chance he got. He had a kid to go back to. Although, Chenle doubted he still had custody if he was running around abducting people in the middle of the night.

The idea that Xiaofei would willingly affiliate himself with this big bad crime boss who was going to take over the ransom negotiations just so that he could ensure Chenle was as safe as he could be was bewildering.

“You really feel that guilty, huh?”

“Yes,” Xiaofei responded without hesitation. “He’s paying me extra to look after you.”

“And by ‘look after’, I presume you mean that it’s your job to make sure I don’t die or escape before the money gets paid.”

He shivered, suddenly remembering that he’d left his jacket behind in the cell along with the letter he’d scribbled and shoved beneath the mattress. He wondered if anyone would find it. He wondered if it would make its way back to Kun.

He wondered if he’d ever get to wear that jacket again.

“I fucked up, Chenle,” Xiaofei said softly, drawing Chenle’s focus back from the void. “If my wife could see me right now, she would be disgusted with what I’ve become. My daughter wants nothing to do with me. And I’ve put you through something that you should never have had to go through. If I could take it all back …”

“What use is saying that now?” Chenle snapped. “It’s done. We’re both scarred for life and you’re never going to talk to your daughter again. I’m not going to forgive you just because you feel guilty.”

It occurred to him that he should be angry. He should be yelling or even going for a punch, but he didn’t feel a thing. First, no fear and now, no anger. The trauma must have finally succeeded in sucking out his emotions.

“I know,” Xiaofei sighed. “That’s why I won’t leave you with that man and I’ll do whatever I can to help you get home.”

Chenle just stared at him without blinking. He wanted Xiaofei to cower under his gaze. He wanted him to feel immeasurable guilt and tear himself up inside. He wanted to have the power, even if it was just for a second, because he was about to be powerless again.

“You should try to get some sleep,” the man suggested after the long pause got too uncomfortable for him to bear. “The drive’s going to be a long one.” 

This infamous ‘guy’ was going to do something to him. Chenle could feel it, and neither he nor Xiaofei was going to be able to stop it.

**18dys 17hrs 16min 30sec**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> dun DUN D U N


	14. A Jacket And A Letter

As soon as Dejun stepped out of the car, he felt it: an all-encompassing sensation of dread and ice-like déjà vu.

The ground beneath his feet was no different. Even the weeds protruding through the cracks in the driveway seemed the same, if not a little overgrown. It was the air that had changed. It was heavier now than it had been three weeks ago.

He slammed the car door behind him and stepped up onto the pavement. He tried not to but his gaze was automatically drawn to that spot. Just a little to the left of where they’d parked.

That was exactly where Chenle was taken from. That was exactly where they found Yangyang, lying on his side and paralysed with terror. That was exactly where the world ended and the nightmare began.

The hand on his shoulder made him flinch far more violently than he ever could’ve imagined and he looked up, half expecting to see a man in a black balaclava, but the only person there was Johnny.

“You okay?”

“Yeah …” he muttered before taking a shaky step forwards just so that he would have an excuse to be rid of that hand. “I’m fine.”

He didn’t have to glance back to know that Johnny wasn’t convinced but he didn’t care about that right now. He just needed to get into the house so that he wouldn’t be standing out here on this cursed slab of pavement for another second.

He made his way up the driveway, fishing around in his pocket for the set of keys he hadn’t used in almost a month, blocking out the sound of Johnny thanking the taxi driver since it was just unnecessary background noise.

When he’d volunteered to take the trip to Beijing, he’d thought he could handle it but now he was starting to realise that maybe he couldn’t.

The door finally gave under the wriggle of his keys and he pushed his way over the threshold and onto the doormat.

This was his home but it no longer felt like it. Now it was alien and hostile and completely unfamiliar. Quiet as well. Almost silent if not for the gentle hum of a TV set coming from the living room.

Ten stuck his head around the door and Dejun had to actually fight the wince that threatened to twist itself into his face.

His best friend did not look good. Sleep deprived, hungry, exhausted in more ways than one, trying to act as if he was happy to see them but failing to do something as simple and natural as smile without it seeming more like a grimace.

They exchanged half-hearted greetings and the briefest of hugs that appeared pathetic in comparison to the way Johnny immediately swept Ten up into his arms the moment he was within reaching distance.

He’d known Ten and Johnny were close. He just wished there was somebody to hug him like that because God knew he needed it just as much.

They were supposed to be here for moral support since Ten was struggling to keep Kun alive by himself but Dejun couldn’t help but feel like he was going to be more of a hindrance than a help.

He still didn’t know how to process most of what was happening.

Johnny and Ten had finally let go of each other and were now muttering in hushed voices, Johnny’s hand on Ten’s shoulder, squeezing reassuringly as the younger scrubbed his hands over his face.

Dejun left them to their intimate catch up and instead reached for the living room door. As soon as he opened it, the voices on the TV were a great deal more distinct and he caught a glimpse of a cheetah licking one of its paws before he crossed the threshold.

The moment he saw Kun’s face, he knew he wasn’t really interested in the cheetah at all.

“Hi, Ge,” he started tentatively without expecting much of a response. “Johnny and I are here now.”

“It’s been twelve hours,” Kun relayed monotonously from where he was sitting on the couch, elbow propped against the padded arm and chin resting in his hand. “Peng Fei triangulated the call to Shengsi County, some abandoned shithole across the Donghai Bridge. He went along with the police convoy and we haven’t heard anything since.”

It was like he was giving some kind of status report. Like he was somehow distancing himself from the situation to an extent where he could relay the basic details without a hint of emotion. Maybe that was how he was getting through this.

“Well …” Dejun croaked without knowing where he was going. “Donghai’s a long-ass bridge. It was always going to take him a while to get there and back. And if he’s got Chenle then …”

He trailed off for reasons he couldn’t quite understand. Perhaps he didn’t want to give either of them false hope that all of this was about to end. Perhaps he didn’t want to jinx it. Either way, the sentence was destined never to reach its conclusion and Kun seemed to be okay with that.

If Dejun was in this kind of state, he could only imagine what it was like for his leader.

The other two entered the room and took their seats on the couch. Dejun joined them and they all turned their attention to the scrolling credits on the screen as the wildlife documentary came to its end.

“Taeyong’s doing what he can back in Seoul,” Johnny reported after a moment’s silence. “He’s trying to negotiate with the CEO and gather as much money as he can. He did the maths and I think he figured out that if we pooled all our savings together, we’d have less than half of what they want.”

Dejun had always suspected that SM didn’t pay them enough.

“It wouldn’t matter even if we could pay,” Kun mused, still without taking his eyes off the list of names casually making its way down the screen in front of him. “The guy I spoke to on the phone said that we missed our window. Either they find him today or we lose any control we had over the situation.”

And just like that, Johnny’s well-intentioned attempt to lift their spirits even just a little was obliterated and blown to smithereens.

They lapsed into silence again and even though he was barely five feet from where Ten sat with his legs tucked up against his chest and his head on Johnny’s shoulder, Dejun felt strangely isolated.

What he wouldn’t give to be able to put his arm around Kun and tell him for certain that somehow – by some miracle – everything was going to be okay, but he knew that wasn’t going to help anyone because he didn’t know if it was true.

Today could be the day they got Chenle back. Or today could be the day they could’ve got Chenle back and missed their chance.

“Hey,” Ten suddenly chirped, sitting up a little straighter against the back of the couch with his gaze fixed on the TV screen. “That’s her, isn’t it?”

Dejun raised his eyes from where they’d fallen to blankly rest on the carpet at his feet and took in the sight of the woman who was suddenly centre stage in the middle of what used to be his living room.

There was no flash of recognition or jolt of understanding but he knew there should’ve been when he felt Kun’s muscles tense beside him.

She looked to be maybe in her early thirties but Dejun knew that, for that to be true, she would’ve had to have a lot of surgical work done to her face to make it that smooth and youthful. Her eyes were hidden by large sunglasses with tiny encrusted diamonds lining the arms, a not-so-subtle flex of wealth.

As if that wasn’t already insulting enough, she was wearing one of those ridiculous fur coats that had once belonged to some poor living creature before it was sacrificed for the colour of its skin. Her high-heeled boots looked like real leather, too.

It was as if she was deliberately trampling over the grave Chenle wasn’t even buried in yet.

She was parading around in front of a sea of cameras, basking in the glory they gave her and the attention she received from the reporters behind them, while her son was being held hostage because of her crimes. She was showing off how much money she owned while still refusing to pay the ransom that might save his life.

Might _have_ saved his life.

There was no guarantee whether or not it was still a requirement.

Along with the others, Dejun watched, almost transfixed by the sheer audacity of it all, as she strutted down the stone steps that stood before the huge hulking walls of her 100-billion-yen-or-something home.

There were two security guards on either side of her with earpieces and everything, dressed all in black in a clear attempt to complement the colour of her “beauty”. In the corners of the camera shot, a few more dark-clad figures occasionally bobbed into view as they struggled to keep the reporters at bay.

This was her first appearance since the news of Chenle’s abduction was released to the public. Of course, there would be reporters clamouring to get a juicy morsel of gossip. And, of course, she would be loving every second of it.

Dejun risked a glance sideways and saw the bulge in Kun’s jaw. He could practically hear his teeth grinding. He’d never seen him that angry.

The woman on the screen stopped just a few steps from the bottom of the staircase, still flanked by her monochrome ogres as she held up her fake-nailed fingers in a gesture intended to bring calm upon the ruckus before her.

Of course, it worked. Of course, they were all too eager to hear what she had to say. What the country’s richest and more selfish mother – if she was even worthy of that title – was going to spew to cover her own back and convince the public that she wasn’t leaving her child for dead.

“I appreciate the concern,” she said once silence had befallen the crowd. The fuzzy heads of microphones could still be seen poking into the shot. “That you’ve all shown towards me and my family in this trying time.”

She brought a hand to her chest and pressed it over her heart, as if she had one. It looked like she might be trying to act choked up or overcome with emotion at the mention of her beloved son’s predicament but Dejun could see right through it since he knew the truth that lay behind her nail extensions and plastic surgery.

Now he understood why she was wearing such ridiculous sunglasses. So that nobody could see the distinct lack of tears in her soulless eyes.

“But I would like to request that we be given some privacy from this moment forward.”

Dejun felt his eyebrows rise. She was asking for the attention to go away? From what he’d heard about her, that should have been the very, _very_ last thing she’d ever do.

“Following a lengthy negotiation with the kidnappers that was, thank God –” She turned her face up towards the sky for a brief second and even added in the dramatic pause for effect. “– successful, my son is now safe, well and recovering at home with me. I ask –“

There was a sudden explosion of bright flashing lights and a surge in the wave of reporters that pushed up against the security guards, all of them choking on their questions as they frantically clung to her every word.

But, in the living room, there was absolute silence.

Throughout the impromptu public address, Ten had been murmuring a rough translation in Johnny’s ear so that he could be as informed as the rest of them, but now that had stopped. It didn’t even sound like anyone was breathing.

Dejun looked to Kun again but, for the first time since he’d known the guy, he couldn’t read the expression on his face. He had no idea what was going on inside that head. Kun just seemed … frozen.

Then their phones blew up.

Fumbling with the buttons, Dejun managed to get past his lock screen only to be bombarded with text messages from what must have been every single person in his contact list.

They were coming in thick and fast and, from the trio of buzzing rhythms that reverberated around the room, the others were having the same experience.

The first text Dejun managed to get up to full size was from Sicheng but even as he was skimming over the words – having to read them several times because his mind was just too numb to focus – he could see glimpses of Xuxi’s name at the top of the screen along with Yangyang’s, Taeil’s, Donghyuck’s and so many more.

_You saw the news? Its not true? Shes lying?_

The answer should be obvious. Absolutely, she was lying. She wasn’t Chenle’s guardian. If he was returned then Kun would be the first one to get that call, not her. And there had been no call.

So Chenle wasn’t returned.

Why the hell would she say that? Just for the attention? Was she really that sick? Or was she just trying to get rid of the bad publicity before somebody revealed the real reason behind Chenle’s kidnapping?

Ten was flicking through his phone at lightning speed, eyes whizzing back and forth as he read whatever was pixelated in front of him. Johnny was slipping out of the room, already babbling away to someone in Korean, probably trying to make sense of the situation himself.

Kun was still frozen, still watching, as Chenle’s mother turned around and strode back up those stone steps with both her bodyguards in tow as the questions bounced off her and went completely ignored.

Dejun felt like he had to start texting people back, reassuring them that nothing that woman had just said was the truth. But was it really reassuring? Even if Chenle was with her, it would still mean that he was home, and yet he wasn’t.

Could he really tell all those people that the boy’s own mother had given them nothing but lies and false hope so that she could protect her image and her precious money?

That was when he heard the key turning in the front door before there was the unmistakable creak of the old hinges that he used to be so familiar with. Ten shot up off the couch and darted out of the room, probably thankful for the excuse to escape.

That left Dejun with a news report he could barely understand and a gege he could barely communicate with.

“Kun-ge?” he asked cautiously, reaching out to touch his shoulder but hesitating at the last second. “Kun-ge, we shouldn’t be listening to her. She’s … twisted, right? So we shouldn’t be listening to anything she says.”

When Kun didn’t even blink, he reached for the TV remote and switched the damned machine off, but all that did was ensure there were two lifeless things in the room instead of one.

Dejun’s hands were still shaking. He couldn’t even process the fact that there were voices coming from the hallway. Voices that didn’t belong to Johnny or Ten.

“Kun-ge …”

The living room door opened, first revealing his members and then a man Dejun had never met but knew the identity of straight away.

“Kun.”

Kun finally moved, whipping around in his seat to identify the owner of that voice. As soon as he registered Peng Fei’s presence in his living room, he rose to his feet and rounded the couch in less than two seconds, mouth already open.

Then he stopped.

It took Dejun a little longer to realise why.

Peng Fei was supposed to return with their little brother but the only things in his hands were a slip of crumpled paper with worried folds and rips in the fragile edges, and a jacket.

“I’m so sorry,” the man said as he held out the article of clothing. “We weren’t quick enough.”

Kun didn’t raise his arm to take the offering. He simply stared at it as though struggling to process its existence in his house.

Too many seconds passed by like that, with no one moving and no one speaking, before Dejun stepped forward and accepted the jacket on Kun’s behalf.

It was cold beneath his fingertips. There were traces of dust all over.

He wanted to check for bloodstains but definitely not with Kun in the same room. So, instead, he carefully folded it over his arm and held it close to his chest, index finger tentatively stroking the material as if he would be able to bring Chenle back just by doing so.

“We have officers scouring the island,” Peng Fei continued, still addressing Kun even if Kun didn’t appear to be listening. “We have road blocks up on Donghai Bridge and the coastguard have been notified as well.”

“Where did you find this?” Dejun rasped hoarsely before he’d even realised his lips were moving. “Where … Where was he before …?”

Before what? Before they moved him? Killed him?

He met Peng Fei’s eyes and saw the private investigator’s gaze flicker to Kun’s motionless figure and then back again. And he saw the miniscule shake of his head. And he knew not to ask anymore questions.

Whatever the truth was, it wasn’t something that Kun was in the right state of mind to hear at this moment. Answers would have to come later. Once Kun had had a chance to process.

“What’s that?”

The leader’s voice was painfully scratchy but his face kept a hold of that freakishly passive expression as he nodded towards the creased paper in Peng Fei’s other hand.

“We found it,” the man explained, once more making an effort to hand a part of Chenle over to his legal guardian. Kun took it this time and Dejun couldn’t help but peer over his shoulder at the characters scrawled there. “Along with his jacket. It was … hidden, and it’s written in Korean. We don’t think his kidnappers knew it existed.”

Dejun’s Korean wasn’t quite fluent but he caught a couple of words.

Like, “I’m okay” and “miss you” and “thank you” and … and “love you”.

There were doodles in the corner of the page, too. Scribbled little ladybugs and flowers, a spaceship and a couple of stars. It was so … so … _Chenle,_ and somehow that made it even worse.

Kun snatched the letter to his chest before Dejun had a chance to read and translate anymore but he got the gist.

Chenle had written that on his own. He wasn’t coerced, there was no gun to his head like there had been with the ransom note. He penned his thoughts in Korean to reduce the risk of his captors being able to read what he’d put in the event that they found it.

And it had been addressed to them.

Kun lurched forwards without any prior warning, face still blank but hand steady as he reached out for the living room doorknob. The only thing that stopped him from ripping it open and storming out into the hall was the arm Johnny planted in his chest.

“Where are you going?” the older boy demanded, taking Kun by the shoulders and positioning himself between his friend and the exit.

Kun didn’t resist. Not at first. He simply stared up at the impediment before him.

“Move,” he said quietly.

“Not until you tell me where you’re going.”

Dejun understood. Something was going on in Kun’s head right now and they shouldn’t be letting him go off on his own. He could do something stupid, destructive, or both. His emotions were running too high for him to be able to make sound decisions.

“I’m going to see that bitch,” Kun growled, seizing Johnny’s wrist and wrenching it off his shoulder. “So, either come with me or get out of my fucking way.”

**19dys 05hrs 00min 37sec**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The long-awaited smackdown approaches ...


	15. That Was Something

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, this is possibly THE goriest chapter I've ever written. And that includes the whole hand thing in 'Bring Them Home'. So, please, beware of what you're about to read. It's the most graphic part of the story so if you're easily triggered then don't proceed any further.
> 
> And please don't kill me.

It could be worse, Chenle told himself for what was probably the fifty thousandth time. It could be a lot worse. He was cold, stiff, uncomfortable and hungry but he wasn’t bleeding or dying. That was something.

For the most part, he’d kept his eyes closed since he’d got here. At first, it didn’t matter because they put the bag over his head again, and he was half asleep from the drive. He just had to keep his feet beneath him and follow Xiaofei’s guidance as he was dragged from tarmac to straw.

Barn. He was sure it was a barn. Or something to that degree.

The floor was dirty and dusty – although not as dusty as that little stone cell – and there were definitely blades of stiff pale grass littered haphazardly about. There was no central heating system and every now and then, an icy draft would prick goosebumps over his bare arms.

He wished he’d thought to grab his jacket before they left the village.

He’d still had the bag on his head when they sat him down, back against some sort of wooden supporting beam, and put the chains on. They were tighter than the other one. Not as rusted, though. That was something.

The first cuff cinched the skin on his right wrist, the links of metal it was attached to looping around the back of the supporting beam so that the second cuff could fasten around his left ankle. 

The restraint wasn’t large in length, probably only just longer than a foot. It meant that his right hand had to stay on the floor beside his hip at all times and his left knee had to be drawn right up to his chest.

Like this, he still had use of two of his limbs but very little room to move them. The chain provided absolutely no leeway. He couldn’t shift more than an inch away from the splintered pillar behind him unless he broke it. And if, by some miracle, he did that, he’d bring the whole roof down.

It’d been hours since they’d left him like this with his leg falling asleep, his shoulders cramping, his back aching and his butt going numb. Even with his left hand free, he hadn’t removed the bag because it was easier to stay in the dark.

That way, he could almost pretend he was somewhere else.

But then he’d heard the creak of the door, felt the sudden burst of cold air and the flood of winter sun that streamed into the hollow space. Dress shoes clicked against the panelled floor, accompanied by the scuff of worn trainers.

Chenle had kept his eyes closed and feigned unconsciousness as the flimsy black sack was ripped from his head. Whoever was here with their expensive dress shoes and strong scent of hair gel, he hadn’t wanted to look them in the face.

He couldn’t have known what would happen if he did.

“He’s young,” had come the voice from above, deep and throaty. “Younger than I thought.”

“Still underage,” followed the reply.

Xiaofei. Xiaofei was here, just like he’d promised. At least that was something.

“Shame … I don’t like hurting kids.”

Chenle’s stomach had flipped at that but he’d managed not to flinch. His spine had been fairly numb by that point, which made the whole pretending-to-be-asleep thing a lot easier.

“Let’s hope I don’t have to do anything more than what’s necessary. All I’m interested in is the money. Keep him alive until I get it and you can have your share. Then we can let him go. Beyond his value, I have no interest in him.” 

“Yes, Sir.”

They’d left after that, and Chenle had finally allowed himself to breathe again.

It could be worse, he’d told himself. Sure, the guy who’d bought him like he was nothing more than a product on a shelf had just implied that hurting him at least to some extent was ‘necessary’, but they’d decided not to do it at that moment. That was something.

And now he was here. Who knew how many hours later. Shifting uncomfortably against the wooden beam and fantasising about being able to straighten his left leg. Every time his fingers so much as twitched, the metal clinked against the floor. It was annoying.

He wondered if the police had managed to track him to the abandoned jail building yet. Maybe they’d found his letter. From what he could remember, it was still pinned between the sheets. He hoped they’d found his jacket. He hoped they’d give it back to Kun.

He wanted Kun to have something of him, even if it was nothing more than a memory of what he’d been a long time ago.

He wondered what was going to happen next, when the hurt was going to come, who was going to administer it and how this hair-gel-smelling guy was planning to extort the money out of his mother. Or his company. Apparently, it didn’t matter where it came from so long as it came.

He wondered and then, as if whatever neglectful God was up there had grown bored of listening to his complaints, the door opened again.

For a minute, he continued his act of unconsciousness, but once the footsteps stopped right in front of him, he brought it to an end.

“I know you’re awake.”

In spite of everything, he smirked as he opened his eyes and raised his head. Xiaofei was standing over him, no mask, and he was holding something the prisoner couldn’t see from his position on the floor.

“Hungry?”

Chenle perked up at once, immediately salivating when he caught sight of the bread and rice on the tray that Xiaofei settled on the ground in front of him. If the bowl hadn’t been placed in his lap and the chopsticks delivered to his free hand, he would’ve snatched them up himself.

It was a tricky process, trying to balance the small container on only one thigh, he’d never been as good at using chopsticks with his left hand as he had with his right and the meal was tasteless but it was so good.

And it was gone too soon.

Xiaofei handed him the bread before he even opened his mouth to ask and within moments, that was gone, too.

His throat was dry from the carbohydrates, there were crumbs everywhere and he’d dropped a few precious grains of rice but his stomach no longer felt like an empty barrel. That was something.

“Water?” he croaked as he wiped his mouth on the back of his hand.

Xiaofei chuckled just a little, “Sorry, no, but I’ve got this.”

Chenle eyed the green bottle that was pressed into his palm, bowl and chopsticks taken away in the same movement before he could use either as a weapon. Both the label and the cap had been removed.

He brought the head to his nose and inhaled. The scent was strong and sour, if a scent could be such a thing, and he vaguely recognised it.

“What is it?”

“Soju.”

Chenle scoffed, holding the bottle out for Xiaofei to take back, “I’m not old en – Wait, what’s the date?”

“November 3rd.”

“I’m not old enough. Come back in nineteen days.”

Xiaofei didn’t accept the bottle. He just sat there, legs crossed idly, twirling the chopsticks between his fingers.

“It’s your birthday in nineteen days?”

Chenle’s arm was starting to hurt so he lowered it, permitting the alcohol to rest against his leg. The expression on Xiaofei’s face was pitying and he found it amusing.

“You gonna throw me a party?” he teased bitterly. “Balloons? Presents? Cake? Excellent. I already know what I’m gonna wish for.”

The anger he held for the man in front of him was most certainly not misplaced and he understood that he had every right to be furious for what the guy had put him through, but there was also a twang of guilt.

Xiaofei was trying to help him. Was protecting him. Had saved his life once already and was continuing to do so even though it would be so much easier for him to run back home to his daughter. Without him, his situation could be very different.

“Just drink it, Chenle,” came the softened plea in response. “It’ll help.”

“With what?”

“The pain.”

Swallowing thickly, Chenle raised the bottle to his lips and took a swig without further protest. The liquid was cold and yet somehow it still managed to burn on the way down his gullet. He couldn’t even identify whether he liked the taste or not.

He was too busy trying not to think about what Xiaofei had just said.

Fluid welled up in his eyes. He wasn’t sure if it was from the fear or the pain in his restricted limbs or the assault on his tastebuds. Either way, he kept drinking even though it stung. Even when the first tear rolled down his cheek. 

Even when the door opened for the third time since his arrival.

He drank until the bottle was pried from his hand and he could drink no longer. Then the only thing left for him to do was watch the three men who entered the barn.

One of them was carrying something that looked like a briefcase and while the other two stopped a few paces in and stayed there, he moved over to the wooden table in the centre of the room, perfectly aligned with where Chenle sat.

He set the briefcase down, unclipped the latches and started pulling things out. Bottles and bandages. 

Chenle looked away, turning his face forwards and closing his eyes. He pressed his lips together and hugged his bound leg closer to his chest but nothing he did could fight the terror slithering up his throat.

The chains clinked together, grating slightly against the wood as they were jostled to and fro. They tightened and then loosened, first on his wrist and then on his ankle.

He could get up and run but his body had been immobile for too long, and even if it hadn’t, those men standing by the door would tackle him as soon as he made a move. Or they would just shoot him in the head.

Which would be the better option?

“It’s going to hurt,” Xiaofei whispered in his ear as he worked to remove the cuff from Chenle’s ankle. “But it’s only for a moment and then it’ll be over. If you struggle, it will make it harder and more painful.”

His fingers wrapped around Chenle’s elbow and then he was being pulled upwards. His feet weren’t ready to support his weight and he stumbled, but the arm around his waist kept him upright.

He eyed the two guys by the door. They were observing him very closely, vigilant, waiting for the opportunity to pounce on him. Each step he took was a step away from them, but a step closer to the table.

The man there reached over to remove something else from his briefcase and that was when Chenle caught sight of the scalpel.

“No …” he choked, digging his heels into the floor and twisting to escape Xiaofei’s hands. “No … No, please don’t … Please … Please …”

“Don’t fight it,” Xiaofei hissed at him, wrapping both arms around his middle and heaving him closer to the table. Closer to that scalpel. “It will only make it worse.”

“Please don’t let them do this!”

He didn’t care that the men were moving towards him, that the guy with the briefcase had started pouring some kind of liquid onto a thick wad of cloth. He only cared about saving himself from whatever was about to happen.

“He’s just a scared kid. Be gentle,” he heard Xiaofei pleading just before his guardian left his side and the muscle men took over.

They held one of his arms each, restraining him to the spot as the briefcase guy approached with the soaked cloth in his hand.

“Get that away from me!” Chenle screamed, kicking and bucking and writhing to no avail. “Get it away! Leave me alone!”

He tilted his head back as far as it would go, evading the cloth for as long as he possibly could before it was clamped over his nose and mouth and he had no choice but to inhale whatever was nestled in its fibres.

The stench was overpowering. Sickly sweet and yet chemical all at the same time. The fingers wrapped around the back of his neck prevented him from trying to wriggle free and he couldn’t shake the feeling that he was suffocating.

The barn started to swim, edges blurring like a watercolour painting. His skull felt like it was in an iron press, like his brain was trying to force itself out through his ears. He didn’t know how long he had left before he passed out.

He waited for the darkness but it didn’t come. The cloth was removed from his face and he sagged, eyes rolling in his head. If his every muscle wasn’t loose and floppy like melted marshmallow, he may have vomited.

From far, far away, he felt his legs being pulled out from underneath him and then he floated. The roof rafters above his head blended together. The light trickling through the wooden slats was far too bright.

His back met solid wood, head bouncing painfully as he was dropped and immediately pinned down by hands that were too strong and faces that had no features. Everything was a wash of indistinct shapes. Sounds were reduced to a buzzing hum.

He knew he had to fight. Distantly, he knew it, but he couldn’t bring himself to begin. The hands on his body were gripping too tightly, undoubtedly bruising him, keeping him cemented to the table.

His head lolled to the side.

Somebody was eye level with him. Somebody familiar. Their mouth was moving, lips forming syllables he couldn’t hear. Their fingers were on him. His chin and the top of his head. They were stroking, rubbing smooth circles over scalp and skin. 

He tried to turn over to the other side but those fingers stopped him. They kept him there. Wouldn’t let him look away from that familiar face with the soundless syllables.

The buzzing was getting louder.

Something metallic and vibrating grazed the side of his head, moving back and forth over the spot just behind his ear. He felt the tickle of hair on his neck as it was severed from the rest of him.

And then he felt the pain.

It was like absolutely nothing he’d experienced before. It was strong and powerful and sharp and severe even though everything else was murky and dull and bland. It cut straight through the drugs and it pierced his soul and he could quite literally feel skin splitting beneath the blade.

His throat burned and only then did he realise he was screaming.

Warm fluid waterfalled down his neck, pooling beneath his head and soaking through the collar of his shirt. In the back of his mind, he knew it was his own blood but he was too focused on screaming to process what that meant.

Scream. Scream. Scream. Scream the pain out. Scream until it stopped. Because it had to stop. There was no way it could go on forever. Scream. Scream. Scream.

The drugs were wearing off with every passing second and the thinner the haze over his consciousness became, the thinner the barrier between him and the pure undiluted agony sizzling through his skull.

Fingers were tugging at the skin on the side of his head. Pulling at something, cutting it off, peeling it away. Any minute now, he was going to hear the snap of his own cartilage.

His throat was raw. His head was spinning. His wrists and ankles felt as if they were breaking as he continued to fight the hands that held him down, left him powerless and vulnerable to the scalpel that sliced him open.

Tears trickled over the bridge of his nose.

Somebody pressed their forehead into his own.

Through the veil of darkness, he heard someone speak.

“You’ll be home for your birthday. I promise you.”

At least that was something. 

**21dys 14hrs 09min 17sec**


	16. Publicity Puppet

“This is a bad idea.”

“It’s not a bad idea.”

“It’s a bad idea.”

“If you’d let me do this three days ago, it wouldn’t have been such a bad idea.”

“No, it would’ve been a worse idea.”

Kun let out a huff that was equal parts frustration and bitter amusement. He knew he’d had better plans. He knew there was a very real chance that he would get both himself and Johnny arrested, or maybe even worse.

He didn’t know how far this bitch was willing to go to keep her secrets secret.

He’d wanted to do this as soon as he saw that news report. He’d wanted to march straight through the doors, punching every security guard he met if that’s what needed to be done, and take the monster by the throat as punishment for what she’d put her child through but, wisely, Johnny and Peng Fei had forced him to stay in the dorm.

At least until he calmed down.

Well, he was calm now, and they couldn’t deter him any longer.

For all he knew, Chenle was dead. They’d heard nothing from this new buyer. No ransom demand, no taunting messages, no proof of torture or a body to bury. They were completely in the dark and waiting for something that might never come.

Somebody had to pay for that. Somebody had to suffer the way that kid had suffered, and since the kidnappers themselves were out of reach, the world’s worst parent would have to do.

Without giving his conscience another chance to hesitate, he shouldered open the door and leapt out of the car. He couldn’t see any bodyguards or security staff from where he was standing but that didn’t mean they wouldn’t come running as soon as they were notified of his presence.

Behind him, he could hear Johnny jogging to keep up as he ploughed towards the front steps of the mansion with his fists clenched in his pockets.

The only benefit of not being allowed to do this three days ago was that he’d actually had a chance to think about what was going down. He knew what he was going to say and he had safety measures in place that he wouldn’t have been equipped with had he stormed up here when he’d initially wanted to.

For the past seventy-two hours, he’d waited. He’d taken every one of Peng Fei’s calls, listening to the status reports and the updates that grew steadily more repetitive every time.

They’d searched that entire island. No sign of Chenle. They’d blocked off the Donghai Bridge and stopped every vehicle that tried to cross over, but still no Chenle. Peng Fei believed they’d already taken him back to the mainland.

The van was found abandoned on the coast, all traces of DNA wiped clean and every fibre of clothing fumigated. All the leads they’d found had gone cold. Except one.

Right on cue, men in black suits with wires creeping down the backs of their necks emerged from various directions, all of them making a beeline straight for Kun as he strode up the stone steps without faltering.

He felt Johnny’s protective grip on his elbow, but he shook it off. He had all the protection he needed.

“This is private property,” the first guard started, holding up a restraining hand that said, clear as day, _don’t come any closer._ “You’re going to have to leave.”

They closed in around him, forming a defensive barrier between him and the entrance. He spotted Tasers on their belts and wondered how much they would hurt.

“My name’s Qian Kun,” he announced and, to his amusement, every single guard before him stiffened ever so slightly. Some of them exchanged worried glances. “I thought you’d know who I am. Let me in or I will call every reporter in this goddamn city and tell them my side of the story.”

It worked like a fucking charm, just like he’d known it would. There was absolutely no way Chenle’s mother would risk the truth getting out, and these guards were aware of that. They would get him whatever he wanted and all he had to do was click his fingers.

After a brief bought of mumbling and a decisive nod from the one who seemed to be in charge, the black-clad men dispersed, leaving their leader to escort the newest intruder into the almighty palace of evil.

Kun glanced over his shoulder as he crossed the threshold and met Johnny’s eye. There was nervousness there and he muttered a brief, “it’s okay”, in Korean as though that would be enough to make it disappear.

In an ideal world, he wouldn’t have brought Johnny here at all. It wasn’t safe, it wasn’t smart and he couldn’t even understand a great deal of Chinese. The only reason he’d come along at all was because he’d refused to let Kun go alone.

Dejun was back at the dorm, making sure Ten was getting sufficient rest and answering all the calls that were flying in from Seoul. Peng Fei was investigating something that was probably going to turn out to be nothing. Peng Fei didn’t even know they were doing this.

The building was modern, sleek and polished until every surface was as reflective as the next. There were pieces of exotic and – in Kun’s opinion – stupid artwork hung up on the wall and a couple of family photographs lined across the cabinets.

Not one of them included Chenle.

“Ma’am?” the guard ahead of them called, rapping his knuckles on the varnished wooden door at the end of the hallway. “You have guests.”

Kun wasn’t surprised to hear the witch’s voice, terse with irritation, filtering through the barrier between them, “I thought I said no interruptions.”

“He says his name’s Qian Kun, ma’am.”

The effect was just as enjoyable as it had been the first time. There was half a second of stunned silence before expensive heels clicking against panelled flooring, gaining speed and distance too rapidly for somebody maintaining their self-control.

Then the door was wrenched open and Kun found himself face-to-face with the woman he’d never wanted to lay eyes on again.

“What the fuck are you doing here?” she hissed, and there was real fear mixed with the hatred in her voice. Her eyes flickered over his shoulder to Johnny.

“I’m surprised you weren’t expecting me,” Kun bit back, stepping past her and moving into the study without the slightest regard for manners or propriety. “You really thought I wasn’t going to show up after you started messing with my kid?”

He spun on his heel so that he was facing back the way he’d come, in full view of the guard’s discomfort, the mother’s fury and Johnny’s poor attempts to conceal how much he was enjoying watching this exchange even if he couldn’t understand most of it.

“So … are we gonna talk about this or what?”

Never before had he seen somebody so angry. She knew she was trapped. She knew he wasn’t leaving without getting what he’d come for and she couldn’t refuse to give it to him because of what he knew.

Silently seething, she didn’t once take her eyes off Kun as she addressed her security guard, “The other one’s irrelevant to this conversation. Get him out of here.”

The man curled a stupidly strong pincer-grip around Johnny’s shoulder with every intention of dragging him away, kicking and screaming if that’s what it took, but “the other one” shrugged him off and even raised his hands, ready to defend if needed.

“Touch him again and I’ll have the biggest broadcasting station in China on the phone in less than three seconds,” Kun snapped coldly. “He stays with me.”

“This matter does not concern –”

“He speaks very little Chinese. He won’t understand half of what we’re saying.”

It wasn’t necessarily a lie. Johnny understood far more than he could verbalise. Chances are, he would probably be able to keep up with a good portion of what was being said even if he couldn’t respond. Kun just didn’t want him to be perceived as a threat.

“Fine!” the bitch conceded, throwing up her hands and stalking back across the room to take a seat at her desk. “Have it your way.”

She gave a dismissive wave of her hand and the guard vanished with the briefest of bows, leaving Johnny to close the door behind him and shut the three of them in that room together.

They’d already established the upper hand. They were in complete control here.

“What do you want?”

Kun let out a bitter scoff of incredulity just to get a glimpse of the expression on her face. He enjoyed belittling this woman. He enjoyed making her feel small and inferior because that was exactly what she’d done to her child.

“What I want is Chenle,” he spat with as much venom as he could muster. “And according to you, he’s here in this house.”

Her scowl did not shift as she replied, “We both know he isn’t.”

“So, you lied,” Kun deduced, as if it wasn’t blindingly obvious. “On national TV. About your kidnapped child. To save your own image.”

She made him physically sick.

“Do you have no conscience?” he asked her, approaching the desk and bracing his hands against the surface so he could stare her down from above. “He’s your son. He’s in this mess because of you and you couldn’t give a shit.”

She glared right back at him, eyes narrowed and mouth drawn into a thin line, “Why are you here, Kun?”

“I want to know what you know,” he growled back. “Because you do know something. You must do. This whole nightmare revolves around you, was inspired by what you did and the people you got killed and whose deaths you swept under the rug for the sake of your own preservation. There’s no way you don’t have any idea what’s going on.”

From behind him, he heard the rustle of Johnny’s hands in his jacket pockets, making sure that his phone was still recording. It was something they’d thought up on the way here for two purposes.

To capture anything said that might give them a chance of prosecuting this bitch and to protect them if they ended up being accused of doing something they hadn’t while under this roof. The monster wasn’t above throwing false accusations in order to get rid of them.

Chenle’s mother crossed one leg over the others, folded her hands over her stomach and inhaled sharply through her nose. She knew what she was beaten.

“I’ll tell you what …” she started, and Kun straightened, brow furrowed in suspicion of what was about to occur. “I’ll pay the ransom. I’ll get him back. But you have to do something for me in return.”

Kun’s throat closed.

He didn’t know how to respond.

There was too much to unpack in what she’d just said.

“Chenle was sold,” he croaked at last. “We don’t know who has him now or what they want from him. Paying the ransom might not even be an option anymore.”

Now it was her turn to scoff, “Oh, trust me. It is.”

Kun wanted to turn around. He wanted to be able to ask Johnny for advice on what the hell he was supposed to do next but he didn’t want her to know just how deeply she was burrowing beneath his skin.

“They contacted you …” he whispered as the realisation hit him. “Didn’t they?”

She was still smirking as she nodded.

“And what, you’re going to give up ₩200 billion? That’s over ¥1 billion. It’s almost your entire net worth. Your company would go under. There’s no way you’d do that for him.”

If she was willing to, why hadn’t she done so when she’d had the chance?

“They lowered the ransom.”

He almost choked.

“What?”

“They lowered the ransom,” she repeated, cool and calm as anything. The power balance had been completely inverted. “The gentleman I spoke to pitched ₩80 billion. Easily affordable. He knew the original demand was far too unrealistic. That’s the problem with amateur criminals. They have no idea what they’re doing.”

If Kun didn’t still have his hands on the desk, he may have fallen over.

“You spoke to him …” he breathed. “They … They called you?”

It didn’t make sense. The last time he’d been in contact with one of the kidnapper’s, they’d said that Chenle’s mother was refusing to pick up the phone. Had this new mastermind found a different way to communicate with her? If so, what was it and why hadn’t it worked before?

“Did you …” It was getting increasingly difficult to inhale. “Did you get proof of life?”

Only now did her smile falter and Kun’s stomach gave a sickening lurch.

“I did.”

He should ask. He really should.

But he didn’t want to know.

Releasing the shakiest breath that had ever occupied his lungs, he dropped his head between his shoulders and mustered up every ounce of psychological strength he possessed before looking back up at one of the most twisted sociopaths to ever walk the Earth.

“What do you want from me?”

She didn’t even hesitate.

“Custody of my son.”

“No,” Kun said at once. “You’ve got to be fucking joking.”

Her tone was steely when she replied, “Do I look like I’m joking?”

Kun’s vocal cords were paralysed. He wanted to volley every insult he knew straight into her smug little plastic face but he didn’t want her to retract her offer. She was the only one who could possibly bring an end to this, but she was asking too much.

He wouldn’t give Chenle back to her. He couldn’t. Not after everything she’d done to him.

“You’re sick,” he concluded, and his voice broke as he said it. He couldn’t believe he’d allowed himself to get his hopes up. “What the hell is wrong with you? You can save him but only if I let you turn him back into your publicity puppet? You abuse him for years, destroy his self-esteem, make him feel like everything you did to him was his fault and now you’re toying with his life like you don’t even care.”

Who was he kidding? Of course, she didn’t care.

“He’s my child, Kun,” she pointed out. “You said so yourself.”

He could tell she was enjoying this. All those years ago when Chenle had filed for emancipation and Kun had signed the adoption papers, she’d been powerless to stop it. Now she was getting revenge on the person who’d taken her poster kid away from her.

“No,” he hissed back, finally stepping away from the desk and retreating towards the door. “He _was_ your child. Now he’s mine and you’re not getting him back.”

He whipped around, seized Johnny’s wrist and dragged him out of the study before he could completely break down and humiliate himself in front of his arch nemesis. It was a blessing that Johnny didn’t ask a single question until they were back in the car.

Until Kun folded his arms on top of the steering wheel, buried his face in the crook of his elbow and screamed.

“What the hell happened? I only caught bits and pieces.”

How was he supposed to explain? No one but him and Chenle understood what it had been like to fight for his freedom against a public figure so powerful and so ruthless she’d been willing to sue them into the ground to get what she wanted.

Nobody would ever be able to comprehend how vital it was that Chenle stay as far away from her as possible.

“They lowered the ransom to 80 billion,” he relayed, still with his face and eyes concealed from view. “She told me she’s willing to pay but only if I relinquish custody of Chenle. We caught the whole fucking thing on recording but we can’t even release it or else she’ll leave him there to die.”

A beat of silence, and then, “Holy mother of God …” 

“I can’t do it,” Kun whimpered, his first tear slipping free and dripping off the tip of his nose to land in his lap. “I can’t bring him home from one hell just to force him into another. I can’t make him live that life again.”

A hand rested between his shoulder blades, soothingly rubbing back and forth as he sobbed into the car’s musty silence.

He had no idea how long it was until Johnny broke that silence.

“I get what you’re saying, Kun, but you have to ask yourself. Which hell is worse?” 

No one but him and Chenle would be capable of understanding why that question didn't have an answer.

**23dys 17hrs 11min 02sec**


	17. It Was The Only Way

Kun felt like there was a massive leaden dumbbell resting on each of his shoulders and another on his chest. Every breath triggered the same dull ache in his gut and the pincer sharp squeeze of his lungs.

He had no idea how long he’d been sitting on the stairs, slumped against the wall with his phone in his lap, waiting for a call from whoever could snap him out of this hell.

He didn’t know what to do.

He couldn’t move without wanting to cry. He couldn’t close his eyes without wanting to scream. He couldn’t say a single word without wanting to curl up on the floor and never get up again.

The ultimatum he’d been given, the choice he had to make, it was tearing him apart from the inside out and he had no idea how to get it to stop.

Did he agree to the bitch’s terms, sign the papers and send his little brother back to live with a woman who’d made him feel like dirt his entire life and used him as nothing more than a publicity stunt? Or did he refuse and allow the nightmare to continue?

To anyone else, the answer may have seemed obvious. Even if he didn’t have Chenle with him, even if his access to him was cut off for good, a miserable Chenle was better than a dead Chenle.

But anyone else wouldn’t be able to understand the kind of toll that over a decade of psychological abuse had inflicted on that kid. It was only going to get worse now that he was older, more famous and could hide his emotions better from the cameras.

Who was to say she wouldn’t resort to locking him up or even beating him as punishment for making her go through all the agony of playing the desperate and aggrieved mother on the news and risking exposing her true personality?

Faintly, he could hear Dejun babbling away to Sicheng over the phone in one of the upstairs rooms. If he tuned his ears finely enough, he would probably be able to make out what they were saying, but he was too tired.

He couldn’t remember the last time he’d gotten more than two hours sleep, and the two hours he had gotten had only been because Johnny had threatened to drug him if he didn’t lie down.

How was he supposed to rest and relax when Chenle’s life was in his hands?

It was nothing like it had been the past few weeks. Before, he’d been helpless and he’d hated every second of it. Except now, there was something he could do to bring an end to this and yet he hated that even more.

It was better to be helpless. It was better not to have to make a decision that could potentially ruin someone’s life. Either way, he would lose Chenle forever.

“Hey …” came Ten’s exhausted tone from behind the closed living room door, and Kun raised his head slightly, confused about who he would be talking to. “I know I look bad but trust me when I say that this is after my beauty sleep.”

There was the crackle of a poor connection before a new voice was buzzing through the speakers, “To be honest with you, no one here looks any better.”

Taeil. Ten was on a video call with Taeil and if Kun remembered correctly, Johnny was in there as well. He should probably move so that he wouldn’t have to listen to what was being said but he didn’t have the energy.

“How’s everything going over there?”

That was a new voice. Jungwoo? Possibly. God, when was the last time Kun had gotten the chance to talk to Jungwoo?

“Bad.”

Kun had been right. Johnny was in there, too.

“Same here,” Taeil responded, and the sympathy was heavy in his tone. “Taeyong keeps trying to persuade our CEO to cough up a couple of billion just so that we’ve got enough from all our savings but I don’t think it’s going to happen even now that the ransom’s been lowered.”

Guilt twisted at Kun’s insides. Taeyong wouldn’t need to be going to such lengths if he would just relinquish custody of Chenle. The others wouldn’t need to be emptying their bank accounts to try and make up enough to pay for him back.

He thought of the last time he and Taeyong had been in the same room together and it only had him feeling worse. He distinctly remembered throwing his friend under the bus during his tirade of anger in Soo Man’s office.

“How’s Kun?” Jungwoo asked.

Kun’s heart leapt. Did he really want to hear what either Ten or Johnny had to say in response to that question?

Johnny let out a long breath, “To be honest with you, I barely recognise him. He’s like a completely different person. When we went to talk to Chenle’s mother, he had this kind of creepy calmness about him.”

“It’s scaring me,” Ten chipped in. “His health’s deteriorating due to the stress and the lack of sleep, I know that, but there are times when I don’t even know who he is. Every time he gets worked up, I keep thinking that he’s going to start hitting someone.”

If Kun had the strength, he would’ve burst into tears.

Had he really been acting like that? Creepily calm and angry and scary? Was Ten really frightened of being on the receiving end of one of his fists? He’d known he was behaving different and he’d believed that he had to in order to be the guardian that Chenle needed to be but …

What was he doing?

What would Chenle say if he could see him now? What choice would he want Kun to make for him? Surely, he would want to be alive.

Everything Kun was doing right now was selfish. He was the one refusing to give up Chenle. He was the one prolonging the suffering. He was telling himself that it was for the kid’s benefit, that he was saving him from his mother’s wrath, but Chenle was so much mature now than he had been when he was fourteen.

He knew what she’d done to him was wrong. He wouldn’t let her get under his skin again. He would fight her tooth and nail until he was old enough to leave. He was strong enough to take it. Kun just wasn’t strong enough to let him.

“Do you need any more of us to come down there?”

“I don’t see how it could help. I think you guys are better staying where you are. Taeyong needs someone to lean on and I know Dream are being difficult.”

“Yeah, I suppose you’re right. It just feels like we’re doing nothing.”

“Trust me. It’s worse over here.”

Kun rose to his feet, turned and padded up the stairs as quietly as possible so as not to alert Johnny or Ten to his eavesdropping. As he passed Dejun’s room, he caught the tail-end of a sentence.

“… but I can’t override his decision.”

He kept walking, right the way to the bathroom at the end of the hall where he locked the door and sank dejectedly onto the rim of the bathtub.

It would be better if he had the capacity to cry. Crying released endorphins. Crying made a person feel just a smidgen shinier than they had when they’d started. But he knew they wouldn’t be tears for Chenle. They’d only be for himself.

His phone started to ring, an unknown number flashing up on the screen, and he meant to decline the call but his muscle memory was working on overdrive and, instead, he answered it.

“Do you know who this is?”

The room suddenly dropped several degrees in temperature.

His throat felt like it had sponge lodged in it.

“Yes,” he croaked, bringing the device to his ear with a trembling hand. “You’re the guy who sold Chenle.”

“Listen to me,” came the curt reply, deadly serious, low and whispery, almost as if the owner was trying not to be detected. “I don’t know what the hell you people are doing over there and what’s taking so fucking long, but this has to end.”

If Kun weren’t so confused, he would probably have agreed. But why was the person who’d detached himself from this crime suddenly reasserting himself into the narrative? Why was he making contact when he’d passed Chenle over in return for a stack of cash?

“The kid’s dying.”

What.

“And the man in charge here isn’t bothered about cutting off a few more body parts if that’s what it takes to reel in the money.”

What.

“Wait …” Kun gasped out, free hand grasping the sink so that he didn’t topple over into the bath. “Wait. Wait. He’s … dying?”

He didn’t ask about the choice of phrasing regarding the “few _more_ body parts”. His panicked and addled mind could only cope with one major shock to the system at once.

“Well, what did you expect?” came the snide snap from the other end of the line. “He’s not staying in a luxury hotel and being tended to by world-renowned physicians. Of course, he was going to get an infection.”

“But I don’t understand,” Kun continued to wheeze, knuckles turning white from how hard he was gripping the basin. “Why … infection? What … happened to him?”

There was an excruciatingly long pause.

“You really don’t know?”

“No!” He felt like his heart was about to beat out of his chest. “I don’t even get why you’re still with him when you supposedly got rid of him!”

Three weeks ago, he never would’ve imagined talking to somebody who was keeping his little brother captive with so much disrespect, but times had changed. He had changed. And everyone had been able to see it except him.

“They took his ear.”

“They …”

Words failed him.

“They wanted to take his entire foot but I managed to convince them to downgrade to just the ear. It was supposed to be delivered along with the new ransom amount. And you should know that if you don’t pay in the next couple of days, I won’t be able to stop them from cutting off whatever appendage they see fit. They’ll keep taking fingers and toes until they get that money.”

He wanted to be sick but the nausea was too distant. Everything – his fear, his anger, his desperation and anxiety – was clouded by a thick layer of fog that just wouldn’t seem to shift.

It was the only layer of protection he had between him and the reality of the situation.

“I don’t want this kid to die,” the kidnapper continued, oblivious to Kun’s status of psychological buffering. “But I only have limited control over what happens here. That’s why I’m begging you. Do whatever you can to get that money before I have to listen to him scream again.”

There was a crisp click and then a long, endless note.

Kun had no idea what happened next. All he was aware of was collapsing to his knees on the bathroom floor and puking up every sliver of bile he had in his stomach into the toilet bowl as his eyes streamed with tears.

The words were playing on a loop inside his head, _the kid’s dying the kid’s dying the kid’s dying the kid’s dying the kid’s dying they took his ear they took his ear they took his ear they took his ear,_ and he couldn’t escape. He could only sob and clutch at his stomach and pray for the mantra to stop.

Chenle had been mutilated and he hadn’t even known. Chenle had been screaming in pain and he’d had no idea.

Chenle had developed an infection, was curled up somewhere in unimaginable pain with shivers wracking his skinny body and poison circulating through his blood while Kun had been sitting on the stairs feeling sorry for himself.

He knew what he had to do now.

It was exactly what he should’ve done as soon as he’d been given the chance.

Flushing the toilet and sagging against the wall of the bath, he combed the sweat-slicked strands of his fringe out of his eyes and retrieved his phone from where he’d dropped it on the tiles.

“It’s the only way,” he whispered to himself as he listened to it ring. “It’s the only way to get him out of there.”

The call connected.

“Hello. I want to speak to Zhong Dai Shui, please … No, I don’t have an appointment but she’ll make time to see me. Just tell her it’s Qian Kun and that I’ve made my decision … Yes, I’ll hold.”

He was surprised none of the others had heard him throwing up. He was surprised he wasn’t continuing to throw up as the images of Chenle’s bloody scalp with a hole where his ear should’ve been kept zipping to the front of his mind.

His ear … They’d cut it off. They’d actually cut off a part of him. And he’d been awake. He’d been screaming. The pain must’ve been unbearable.

“Kun? I hear you have something to say to me.”

Just the sound of her voice thawed the ice in Kun’s veins and replaced it with white hot flames that licked at his innards and crawled up his throat and burst free from his lips before he had the chance to stop them.

“How could you not tell me they cut off his ear and sent it to you?”

There was silence and he almost laughed. If his mouth wasn’t so dry and his oesophagus wasn’t so raw, he probably would’ve. The idea that she’d believed he would never find out what she’d hidden from him.

The ear – her child’s severed ear – had been the proof of life she’d talked about.

“I didn’t want to worry you with unnecessary details,” she replied at last, clearly having regained whatever composure had made her so cold-hearted in the first place.

Kun didn’t believe, not for a single second, that she’d been at all concerned for him. She’d kept that information secret for her own personal gain, whatever that may be.

“Where is it?” Kun rasped, placing a hand over his stomach in an attempt to calm the raging storm threatening to spill his guts up once again. “Did you … Did you keep it?”

He knew very little about medicine but maybe, if she’d put it on ice or … or something, then a surgeon would have a chance of reattaching it once Chenle was back.

He should’ve expected the answer that came next.

“I disposed of it, of course. Now, are we going to continue debating this topic or are you going to tell me what I want to hear?”

This woman was a monster. She was speaking to him as if this was a simple business negotiation, not as if they were discussing how short to cut her son’s life. She was utterly emotionless.

“I hate you,” Kun whispered, a couple of fresh tears trickling down his face. “And he hates you, too. He will never cooperate with what you want him to do. He’s not that little boy you used to manipulate and dehumanise. He’s all grown up now.”

It was the only way.

“Pay the ransom,” he demanded. “I’ll sign over custody. Just pay the ransom. Just … Just get him out of there.”

It was the only way.

**25dys 14hrs 48min 16sec**


	18. Brain-Melting Fever

Chenle’s world consisted of three things: breathing, darkness and pain. There was nothing else. Absolutely nothing. Just those three things: breathing, darkness and pain. And he could escape from none of them.

Technically, it wouldn’t be so dark if he would just open his eyes, but he wasn’t about to do that. Every time he tried, he was accosted with a burning bombardment of excruciating brightness. It wasn’t worth it. It was easier to be blind.

Breathing wasn’t exactly an option either. No matter how badly he may want to just stop altogether, he couldn’t. His lungs protested his every attempt. His airways hitched in a sharp gasp for air every two seconds without caring how tight it made his chest.

And the pain. He used to be able to locate the source of it. He used to be able to remember where it was coming from and why it was so intense. He’d lost that ability now. It was in every part of his body.

He burned. His skin was constantly covered in a thin sheen of sweat that clung to the side of his neck and fused his rancid T-Shirt to his back. He knew his temperature was through the roof but his muscles still jerked with uncontrollable shakes and he was always so damn _cold._

Every muscle had turned to stone: stiff, immobile, heavy. Every joint was now cement: stiff, immobile, heavy. It hurt. More than he’d ever imagined something could hurt.

The rough interior circumference of the shackles that kept his right hand and left ankle chained to the barn’s supporting beam did nothing to help. The sharp sting was a constant reminder that at least two layers of his skin had been rubbed off.

The cramp in his back, neck, shoulders and leg seemed like nothing in comparison to everything else. It was almost possible to forget that he couldn’t move two of his limbs and therefore had to sleep sitting upright with his head lolling uncomfortably to the side.

He had no idea how frequently he was conscious and even then, he wasn’t really _consciously_ conscious. He was just kind of … floating. He would drift for a few minutes, try to fend off the pain before inevitably giving up altogether and returning to the void.

“Chenle?”

There was that voice again. The only voice he ever heard that wasn’t his own. He’d forgotten what any and all other human beings sounded like because that voice was his only source of communication. And comfort.

“Chenle, buddy, eyes open. Come on.”

No. Too painful. Too bright. His head would burst. His eyes would pop out. His brain would short-circuit. No.

He forced a groan out through his parched throat by way of refusal.

“Okay, you can keep your eyes closed but I’m going to need you to swallow these pills.”

Pills? For the pain? Would they help with the pain? Or just put him to sleep forever? He couldn’t decide which option was more appealing to him.

“They’re the only antibiotics I could find so come on, open up.”

A rough hand gently cupped his chin and lifted his head. Obediently, he parted his lips and immediately felt the bitter taste of two dissolving tablets on his tongue. He might have started trying to chew them if the rim of a water bottle wasn’t pushed up against the bottom row of his teeth.

The hand carefully tilted his head back and a stream trickled down his throat, washing the pills down with it. His gag reflex kicked in before his ability to swallow and he choked, a few droplets splashing onto his face.

“Good boy,” came the soft praise, a thumb moving across his chin to gather the excess moisture. “You’ll never know how sorry I am that this happened to you.”

Maybe that would mean something if Chenle could actually remember what it is that’d happened to him. It was all too blurry, fuzzy and blank. He couldn’t even remember what had made him so sick to begin with.

He felt his head being carefully manoeuvred to the side, cradled in one gigantic palm, before there was an uncomfortable prickling sensation followed immediately by a blast of agony so severe it ripped an almost animalistic yelp from his throat.

Instinctively, his hands tried to jerk outwards to defend him but only one of them got there and even then, it was too weak to do anything. His right was yanked back by the chains and, in turn, his left ankle was given a painful wrench.

He whimpered again, pathetically pawing at the arm fiddling with the side of his head.

“I know, I know,” hummed the voice. “But I have to clean it or the infection’s just going to get worse.”

The tape was peeled away from his scalp, taking a couple of strands of overgrown hair with it, and then his wound was open and freezing cold and it _hurt hurt hurt._

He gave his chained a hand another weak tug but the only result was a rattle of metallic links and a twinge of damaged muscle as his left leg was forced to bend even further towards the supporting beam.

Something wet and hot trickled over the bridge of his nose. He tasted salt on his lips.

And then more pain. White hot, fiery, electric bolts of agony that ricocheted down his neck and reverberated through his skull. If he had the voice, he would scream, but the only sound that came out was a pitifully strangled wail.

His free leg kicked out uselessly. His fingers were numb but he managed to get them to curl into the sleeve of his assailant, giving it a couple of pleading pulls that did nothing.

The stench of antibacterial saline was clawing its way down his throat and choking the life out of him. The damp, steady scrub against his mutilated skin was pushing him further and further towards the brink of unconsciousness.

He could smell blood, too. A lot of blood.

“Shit, kid … I’m so sorry. Just hold on a little longer for me.”

Every time the cleansing wipe was removed from his scalp, he allowed himself to believe that it was over, but then a new one would just take its place and the sting of the chemicals would return to full throttle.

He would’ve given his right hand to just pass out and save himself the torture, but his mind must have decided that he’d already spent too long away from reality and now it was time to make up the hours he’d lost.

It hurt. It hurt. It hurt. It hurt.

He wanted it to stop.

He _needed_ it to stop.

He was going to die from the pain.

“I’m almost done, buddy.”

His eyes were rolling behind their closed lids. Every breath was a chore that grew more and more ragged each time he inhaled. He could feel his own heartbeat in his ears.

Well … Ear.

Oh. That was why he was sick. He remembered now. They took his ear. They drugged him, pinned him to a table, shaved his hair and cut it off. He’d screamed. They’d ignored him.

On second thoughts, it was a billion times easier not to remember at all.

Just as the darkness finally began closing in, tempting him with the beauty of its all-encompassing nothingness, the administrations stopped and he heard the crinkling rip of a fresh dressing being removed from its packaging.

“One last bit,” was the only warning he got before the gauze was being smoothed over the gaping hole where his ear had once been. He was too numb to bother with the pain. “There we go. Good job, buddy.”

Fingers threaded through his hair, thankfully on the opposite side of his head to the site of injury, and he leaned into the touch with a sigh of relief. That’s what he liked about the voice. It was always comforting him, even when it was causing him pain.

“I spoke to your gege again.”

Chenle hummed to show he was listening even though he could barely comprehend what was being said.

Which gege? He had more than a few.

“He paid. Do you hear me, Chenle? The boss says you can go home.”

Home. Where was home? Right now, it felt like home was the floor of this barn with loose pieces of straw strewn in every direction and a sunrise that always hit him directly in the face. Was that right? Was this home? He certainly spent all of his time here.

Or was it that tiny room made of stone where the door made a screechy noise and the bed smelled of mould? He’d been there a while, too. Had that been home? Was it still home? Was he just here on vacation?

Some vacation …

Was there something before that? Or had he always lived in that tiny room made of stone? He felt like there should be something more, something beyond what he could remember and something that didn’t remind him of loneliness and fear. He just couldn’t recall what it’d been.

He hoped that, wherever it was, he’d been happier there than he was here. 

“Your gege’s coming to get you.”

That sounded nice. If only he could find the strength to ask which gege, when he was coming and why he was taking so long. If it was that easy for him to be reunited with his brother then why had they waited until he lost his ear?

If the voice hadn’t still been cradling his head in one of its massive hands, he would’ve slumped to the side and resigned himself to the crippling back pain and muscle-twisting cramp that position would’ve left him with.

“Chenle?”

Fingers drummed against his cheek. He ignored them. He wanted to go to sleep. Sleep was the only time of his day when he didn’t have to hurt.

“You can hear me, right?”

Yes. He just didn’t want to acknowledge that he could hear. Every sound was too loud. It grated against his eardrums. He still had two eardrums so he could still use the plural. Just because they’d removed the outer shell didn’t mean he’d lost function altogether.

It didn’t make it any less painful, but at least there was that. He wasn’t going to be deaf. He couldn’t be a deaf singer. That just didn’t work. He couldn’t be a singer with a major facial disfiguration either but somehow that didn’t occur to him.

His mind kept wandering off on tangents. Anything to keep him from the here and now. Anything to make the voice, however nice it was being, just go away and give him some peace and quiet.

“Okay, buddy.”

The hand disappeared. His skull rolled forwards, the newly-applied dressing tugging a little on the strands of his hair that had escaped the electric clippers. There was a rattle somewhere down by his left and his ankle was jostled.

“I don’t care what they say,” the voice was muttering. It no longer sounded like he was trying to converse, either. He was just talking to himself. “We’re gonna have to leave a little earlier than scheduled.”

Chenle felt his brow furrow ever so slightly when the cuff was removed from his foot, dropping to the wooden-slated floor with a harsh banging noise that was just far too loud.

He let his leg fall to the side, quadriceps screeching in relief at finally being allowed to move without restraint. Even if they didn’t understand why.

Shadows shifted in front of him. The voice was shuffling across the ground and its movements had a kind of urgency it hadn’t displayed before now. Apparently, there was something important that needed to be done.

The second shackle scraped against the already-raw skin of his forearm before that, too, was unclasped and discarded.

“Hold onto me,” the voice ordered softly, taking his wrist and guiding it across his shoulders. Too tired to question why, Chenle brought up his other hand to cling to the front of the voice’s shirt. “That’s it. Good boy.”

His knees were scooped up, finger dug incessantly into his ribs and then he was flying.

It felt like floating. Just … realer. Warmer, too. Being cradled in a pair of strong and caring arms against a chest through which he could feel a steady heartbeat was a concept that had grown too unfamiliar to him.

He nestled his nose into the crook of the voice’s neck and breathed in the alien scent of fresh air as the voice carried him through the barn door and out into the sun.

If he didn’t know for a fact that it would destroy his little protective bubble of painlessness, he would’ve opened his eyes and allowed himself to appreciate the sky for the first time in weeks.

“What the hell are you doing?”

“We’re going now.”

Too loud. His face crinkled in displeasure and he tightened his arm around his caretaker’s shoulder as though that would be enough to convince him to stop talking.

“No, we’re not.”

“I’m sorry. I missed the part where you were appointed leader of this operation.”

“The idea was to wait.”

“And now it’s to go.”

“You didn’t even cover his face?”

“Look at him. He’s got a brain-melting fever and hasn’t responded to anything I’ve said for the last ten minutes. Trust me. He’s not going to be identifying anyone. Now open the doors and start the motherfucking engine.”

“So are you going to be the one to take responsibility when the boss finds out you were too weak-minded to wait another hour?”

“Let’s not pretend you don’t have orders to kill me as soon as you’ve got the money. We both know I was never meant to live to see the end of this.”

There was no further conversation after that. Footsteps retreating, a vehicle door being wrenched open, and then the rumbling hum of a motor gradually waking up.

The sun was blotted out as soon as the voice climbed into the back of the van and Chenle’s body gave a particularly jerky and violent shiver, goosebumps rising up over every inch of his exposed skin.

“I know … I know …”

Then he was being lowered and he thought for a moment that he was going to be set down on the cold, unforgiving floor, but then the voice was settling him in his lap and he burrowed even further into his neck.

It was so cold. He tucked his hands against his body and drew his knees in closer, curling up as small as possible in his captor’s arms.

The last of the light was extinguished along with the slamming of the van door.

“Where we going?” Chenle whispered hoarsely, still without opening his eyes.

He could feel the vibrations of the voice’s chest as it responded to him, “You’re going home, Chenle. Remember? Your gege’s coming to get you.”

To him, that still meant nothing.

Maybe it should’ve meant something.

He went to sleep so as to escape everything.

**27dys 11hrs 06min 19sec**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Coming up to the chapter we've all been waiting for ...


	19. - His Boy -

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Suuuuuuuuper long chapter

“It’s 9am.”

Kun opened his eyes at Peng Fei’s words and finally stopped tapping anxiously against his thighs. He couldn’t believe the moment was here. He’d started believing far too long ago that it wasn’t ever going to arrive.

“Kun,” Peng Fei prompted from the driver’s seat beside him. “We can’t afford to wait.”

Those were the words that truly jogged Kun back from the brink he’d been steadily crawling towards every day for the last month. Peng Fei was right. There wasn’t time.

The abductor’s words were still revolving around in his head, _the kid’s dying the kid’s dying the kid’s dying the kid’s dying the kid’s dying._

Chenle had held on long enough already.

Wrestling with the seatbelt that he’d been wearing for no good reason since they hadn’t moved from their parking space at the side of the road in almost half an hour, he tumbled out of the car and started towards the road block.

Behind him, Peng Fei kicked the engine into gear and the smell of exhaust fumes wafted over on the early morning wind.

Begging his hands just to stop shaking long enough for him to do his job, he moved aside the traffic cones that’d been abandoned on the tarmac and shifted the large plastic sign that read: ROAD AHEAD CLOSED.

They weren’t real, he reminded himself when his conscience started barking criticisms about interfering with government property. The kidnappers had placed them there to ensure there would be no unwanted visitors.

The road was desolate anyway, hidden so deep within the wilderness that it probably wouldn’t get more than a couple of drivers a day.

Peng Fei teased the accelerator, edging the car through the space Kun had made in the barrier at a wary crawl. As soon as he was clear, Kun replaced the cones and the sign and scrambled back into the passenger seat.

 _Hold on, Chenle,_ he murmured inside his mind. _Gege’s coming. Just hold on a little longer._

He kept his eyes on the speedometer behind the steering wheel, watching the thin red needle creeping further and further up the scale until it was settled comfortably over the number 50. The velocity the kidnappers had told them to drive at until they were given the signal.

The instructions Kun had scribbled down as the man over the phone relayed them to him were balanced on the dashboard in front of him but they weren’t needed. He’d read the words enough times to know them by heart.

In his opinion, they were unnecessarily detailed. Too complicated. Every spare second they spent making sure they adhered to each and every condition was another second Chenle wasn’t on his way to the hospital.

The trees shot past. The greenery was getting thicker the further they drove. If something happened to them out here – not if … _when –_ it was going to take forever for the emergency services to find them.

“Remember,” Peng Fei grunted, slicing through the antagonising silence. “No matter what happens, no matter what you see or hear, you stay behind me and you keep your mouth shut. I’ve done this before. You haven’t.”

Kun didn’t need a reminder. He was terrified enough as it was.

What if he screwed up? What if he did something stupid and got someone hurt? What if they were driving into a trap from which they were never supposed to escape? What if they were ambushed? What if Peng Fei was killed and Kun was left alone out here? What if Chenle wasn’t even here at all? What if he’d died since their last interaction?

They were doing everything they’d been told. They were driving a black Octavia Skoda with two suitcases strapped to the roof at 50mph down a deserted forest road at exactly 9am. But there were still so many things that could go wrong.

There was no reason for these people to uphold their end of the bargain. Once they had the money that was currently stuffed into a couple of duffel bags in the back seat, they could just as easily eliminate every possible witness and flee the country.

Kun was only here because it’d been one of the terms in the agreement. Peng Fei had managed to negotiate that he be present, too, but it’d been difficult. Kun almost could’ve been doing this by himself.

“How long are they going to make us drive?” he whispered, wincing at the scratchiness to his own voice.

“No idea,” came the expected reply. “But they’ll be watching. They want this over with just as much as we do.”

Nobody wanted this over with as much as Kun did.

Except perhaps Chenle.

Minutes crawled by far too slowly. Each one was an age in and of its own. Kun had resumed his thigh-tapping just to give his quivering hands something to do. He couldn’t stop scanning the tree line for any sight of a sniper hiding behind the bushes.

There was a very real possibility that he was going to die today and he couldn’t even remember the last thing he’d said to Ten, Johnny or Dejun when he’d left the house. At least, regardless of the outcome here, they wouldn’t be afraid of him anymore.

His heart might as well have stopped when the stone struck the windshield with enough force to splay a simple spiderweb of cracks across the glass. He jumped so violently that he hit his knee on the underside of the dashboard. Even Peng Fei flinched.

The car screeched to a stop immediately, tyres losing particles of rubber as the friction scraped the tyres against the road. The speedometer had barely hit zero when Kun was fumbling with the door and lurching out of his seat.

Peng Fei had already done the same on the other side, holding up a hand to signal to Kun that he stay where he was, safely shielded behind the still-open door. Kun obeyed.

“Money?”

Whatever they’d been expecting, it wasn’t for a boy – no older than twelve – to emerge from the undergrowth with a child’s slingshot swinging playfully from his hand. This was no place for somebody so young, and yet he had managed to hit a moving target with a very small missile so he clearly had something going for him.

Kun swallowed.

The sight of that kid was bringing back memories of Chenle when he was still baby-faced and tiny, tugging on Kun’s sleeve and asking him with those huge watering eyes if he would, please, adopt him so he could escape his torturous existence.

“We’ve got it,” Peng Fei called back. He didn’t seem phased by any of this at all. “Where do you want it?”

“Here’s fine.”

Kun stayed exactly where he was as Peng Fei fetched the duffels from the backseat and deposited them on the road just a few feet in front of the boy. He retreated without turning his back, both of them watching as the kid unzipped each bag and checked the supply.

It was clever, Kun thought. Sending a child to do this. Maybe he was the offspring of one of gangsters or maybe he was just some body they’d pulled off the street and paid to be a human shield, but either way they knew it was the safest bet. No one would hurt him.

The boy, finally satisfied with the status of the money, sealed the bags shut and straightened up so he could swing their bulging weights over his skinny shoulders. He stumbled a little and Kun had to fight the urge to step forwards and help him.

“Three miles that way,” the boy said, jerking his thumb in the direction they’d already been heading. “There’s a payphone. Wait there. Once the sum’s been verified, you’ll receive instructions on where to collect the product.”

Product. He was talking about Chenle. Chenle who had become exactly that: a product. He’d been dragged and slung around against his will, passed over by whoever had the most money and now they were literally paying to be the next to take possession.

Peng Fei was already climbing back into the driver’s seat and Kun almost cracked his head open on the doorframe as he hastened to follow. Just like that, they were leaving their only bargaining chip in the hands of a child and watching him disappear in the rear-view mirror.

“Shouldn’t we …” Kun’s throat had closed up. “Shouldn’t we follow him or …?”

“No,” Peng Fei responded at once. “He’s got nothing to do with this. He probably doesn’t even know what’s going on. If we follow him, they won’t give us Chenle.”

“What if they don’t give us Chenle anyway?”

Silence. Peng Fei glanced over. Kun couldn’t read him. He’d never really been able to read him since the moment they’d met in the CEO’s office. He didn’t look even remotely unnerved. He was the picture of perfect calm.

“Then we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.”

That answer was not at all reassuring.

“There,” Peng Fei muttered before Kun could rattle off any more questions, bringing the vehicle to a smooth stop right beside the outdated plastic booth where the telephone hung in its cradle.

Once again, Kun was rolling out of his seat and skirting around the hood of the car. Some part of him was hoping he would hear the ringing as soon as he reached the booth but there were several more moments of excruciating passivity.

He was practically vibrating with anxiety, bouncing on the balls of his feet and wringing his hands at his sides as he waited for the phone to come to life. He sensed Peng Fei behind him, hanging back by the car and keeping a watchful eye out for anyone who might suddenly come sprinting out of the woods.

There was no one.

There was nothing.

Chenle could die while they were standing there, doing nothing to help him. There could be no call at all. It could’ve just been a ruse to get them out of the way so the bastards could count up their money.

Just as Kun was about to whip around and beg Peng Fei to tell him why they weren’t reaching out, the antique mechanics began to whir and the shrill warble cut through the whistle of the tree leaves. 

He ripped it from its hook. The surface had been chipped and scratched from decades of use and it almost slipped between his sweat-slicked hands before he managed to get it to his ear.

Ear … They’d taken Chenle’s ear …

“Hello?” His voice came out breathless and panicked.

“Qian Kun?”

He almost collapsed to his knees with the relief.

“Yes! Yes, it’s me. We gave the kid the money. It’s all there. Where’s Chenle?”

_Tell me … Tell me or I will find you myself and tear you to pieces. Well … I probably won’t, but the man I have beside me will._

“One more mile. Clearing on the left, but listen to me, Kun! You cannot go back the way you came! I know it’s the quickest route to the hospital but they’re waiting for you and they will kill you. All three of you.”

That really, really should’ve set Kun’s teeth on edge and had his heart trying to crawl into one of his lungs for safety, but it didn’t. He barely even heard the words that were being spoken to him because the only thing that mattered was Chenle’s location.

A month. An entire month and now he finally had a location. Who cared what else this guy had to say?

“And Kun?” He’d almost hung up. “Tell Chenle I’m sorry.”

He was gone without an explanation as to why he would want such a thing when he’d been part of the problem in the first place. If he was feeling guilty now then he should’ve thought about that before he kidnapped a nineteen-year-old.

But none of that mattered.

“You heard that?” he threw over his shoulder as he lunged back towards the car.

Peng Fei already had the keys in the ignition. “Yup. One more mile. Clearing on the left. Take the long way back or we’ll all be dead.”

One more mile between him and Chenle. One more mile and he’d have his boy – _his_ boy – back. Everything else they could deal with later. His mother, his disfigurement, his trauma. There would be time for explanations and healing.

There would be time for everything. His favourite food, his favourite movie, his favourite too-expensive-designer-brand-of-choice. Nothing was too much. He would have the world. Kun would make sure of it.

Peng Fei’s driving was definitely not at a legal speed but the needle pushing ninety ensured that they made it to the specified clearing in exactly seventy seconds. Kun counted every single one.

This time, he was out of the car before it’d stopped at all.

The area looked like a very large layby, possibly a rest stop for truck drivers or a plot of barren land where a group of unimaginative campers could set up their tents. It was dusty and dirty with tree stumps, fallen logs, a few abandoned bits and bobs that included a filthy old mattress, and a heap of ash that may once have been an attempt at a fire.

But nowhere a person could be.

“Chenle!” Kun yelled, vaulting over a sofa that was missing all its cushions and frantically searching for the secret storage unit that had to be somewhere around here. “Chenle!”

He had to be here. It couldn’t be a trick. That guy couldn’t have lied. He’d sounded too sincere. He’d told them how to evade the people who were trying to kill them. He’d told them how to keep Chenle safe so why would he lie about where he was?

“CHENLE!”

For hours now, he’d been fighting the urge to sink the ground and cry but there was no reason to hold back anymore. His boy wasn’t here. He’d broken his promise and failed to bring him home.

His knees hit the dirt and he sagged like a deflating balloon, allowing his chin to roll forwards onto his chest and his fingers to curl into his hair. Now that the tears had permission to fall, they wouldn’t stop.

He couldn’t see. He couldn’t hear. He couldn’t think. He couldn’t breathe.

He’d made a promise the day he’d signed those adoption papers to protect Chenle with every single thing he had and he’d let him down. No. He hadn’t just let him down. He’d let him die.

If he wasn’t here, he wasn’t alive.

Footsteps were circling around him, taking the greatest care with each step. Peng Fei was scoping the area while Kun knelt there and sobbed, searching for the boy they were never supposed to find.

And then those footsteps took off with a kind of urgency so intense that Kun lifted his head before he could remember giving his body the command to do so.

He watched through the blur of his tears as Peng Fei sprinted over to the incredibly unspectacular and extraordinarily ordinary mound of dirt at the edge of the clearing, flung himself down on top of it and started digging with his bare hands.

Kun gaped, wondering if the shock of realising they’d been deceived had driven the man to madness, but then his mind made the connection.

“Fuck, no …”

In less than three seconds, he was at the private detective’s side despite his legs’ firmest protests, ferociously raking his fingers through the mud to help deepen the hole Peng Fei had managed to make during his head start.

The mound had been put there recently. It was a different colour to the rest of the dirt around it. It was damper and fresher and Kun could only hope there wasn’t much more of it between him and his target.

He was already exhausted from a night of absolutely no sleep but the adrenaline kept him going no matter how harshly he was breathing or how tightly his chest was clenching.

How long could someone survive under all of this? How long before they ran out of air? Had Chenle even had that much time when they’d buried him to begin with? He was already hurt and sick. Had the infection been spreading at a rate fast enough to kill him before the suffocation could?

 _You’re alive,_ Kun’s internal prayer kicked up again. _You’re alive and you’re fine. You’ve been waiting for me. You waited for me to find you. Any minute now, I’m going to find you. You’re alive. You’re alive and you’re fine._

His fingertips scraped something solid and he let out a strangled cry that held no words or emotion. Just an expulsion of the air that’d been threatening to burst his lungs.

He kept digging, tossing aside handful after handful until the smooth metal surface of a 2000 litre water tank lid was spread out in front of him with its latches exposed even if still clogged with dirt and soil.

_You’re alive._

_You’re alive._

_You’re alive._

He scooted backwards to make sure he wasn’t in the way before he tore off the latches, braced himself, and heaved. With his and Peng Fei’s combined strength – and Peng Fei was the size of a small car – they almost ripped the entire thing apart.

Excess dirt trickled down into the container like some kind of grainy waterfall and Kun got a good portion of it in his eyes when it was flicked up by the lip of the lid but he blinked past the pain.

And let out a shamelessly loud sob.

The space was just tall enough for Chenle to sit upright but he was semi-slumped anyway with his legs coiled against his chest and his face screwed up from the glare of the sudden brightness.

He turned into his own shoulder and brought a hand up to try and shield his eyes. His movements were sluggish, shaky and uncoordinated, his entire body was spasming with shivers and his face didn’t have a lick of colour in it despite dripping with sweat.

The dressing taped to the side of his head had a deep scarlet splotch in the centre.

Kun slid into the container and dropped to a crouch, still gasping and hiccupping through the snot and saliva that was clogging his airways.

“I’m here … I’m here … I’m here …”

He put one hand on Chenle’s knee and another on his arm, gently guiding it away from his face so he would be able to see him. He made a conscious decision to ignore the raw welt of filleted skin that circled his wrist.

Chenle looked up at him with glassy eyes but even with the fever raging inside of him, there was the flash of recognition Kun had been praying for.

He completely broke when his boy calmly reached out and put his arms around his neck in a very weak but _very_ appreciated hug.

“I’m here,” Kun choked. “I’m right here. I’m here.”

He was scared to squeeze him too tight. He was scared to break him when he was already so broken. The heat was emanating off him in waves. His lips and fingernails were tinted blue.

“Kun …” came Peng Fei’s gentle prompt from above.

Kun nodded without looking. He knew they had to move. This place wasn’t safe, it wasn’t clean and it wasn’t where Chenle needed to be. Plus, there were a bunch of ruthless gangsters out there with the intent to shoot them in the back.

Securing his arms around Chenle’s middle, he pushed up with his legs and easily lifted the wispy little thing off the floor of the water tank. He hadn’t lost too much weight but it was just enough to be noticeable. And heartbreaking.

Chenle was doing absolutely none of the work. He held onto Kun’s neck but other than that, he was like jelly. The fiery temperature of his skin was too alarming to wait any longer.

Peng Fei pulled both of them out of the ground and then they were heading back towards the car, Kun cradling Chenle against his chest as if he were made of glass because, honestly, it felt like it.

Right up until he slid into the back seat and settled the boy on his lap with his heavy little head nestled beneath his gege’s chin, he kept up an endless string of whispered comforts that he wasn’t even sure Chenle could hear.

Ten minutes ago, he’d been ready to curl up and die in the dirt. Now he was safe in a car, driving towards a hospital at warp speed with an armed detective at the wheel and his boy – _his_ boy – nuzzling against the side of his neck.

He tried to stroke his hair but as soon as he felt the dreadlocks matted with dried blood, he had to stop.

He couldn’t think about it.

All he could do was keep repeating the only words he knew how to say, “It’s okay. I’m here. I’m right here. It’s okay. You’re okay. I’m right here.”

Chenle’s grip on him never loosened, even after he lost consciousness.

**27dys 14hrs 01min 01sec**

**You can stop the clock now.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yay!


	20. Gege's Apology

If Kun could will the car to go faster without breaking every speed limit known to man and risking a fine bigger than the ransom he’d just paid to get Chenle back, he would’ve. One journey had never taken so long.

“We’re almost there,” came Peng Fei’s voice from the front seat, worried eyes glancing at them through the rear-view mirror. “How’s he doing?”

Kun cupped Chenle’s chin and tilted it up slightly so he could get a better view of colourless skin, rivulets of sweat and smears of dried blood. He had no idea how long it’d been since the kid had passed out in his arms, still with his fingers gripping Kun’s shirt.

“Well, he’s breathing,” he reported, and his voice shook almost as much as Chenle’s entire body. “But it’s really fast and he’s burning hot. This is sepsis or something, right?”

Peng Fei didn’t respond but the needle on the speedometer did creep a little further up the scale. It did nothing for Kun’s confidence and he brought Chenle’s face back into the hollow of his neck just to keep him as close as possible.

All day, he’d been running on adrenaline and adrenaline alone, but now that he was safe and on his way to a hospital, that adrenaline was wearing off. He was only just realising how terrified he’d actually been, not just for Chenle but also for himself. And he was still terrified but for different reasons.

The infection had spread into every last cell of Chenle’s body. His temperature must’ve been through the roof and yet he was quivering like a phone on vibrate. Kun didn’t know what else he could do other than hold him and pray they reached the hospital soon.

“Alright, we’re here.”

Right on cue, they pulled up outside the hospital and shuddered to a very clumsy stop in a parking space that was most definitely not legal. Kun peered out of the window, shaking with dread and anticipation.

He was about to let a group of strangers rip Chenle from his arms when he’d only just gotten him back.

“Stay in the car,” Peng Fei told him, already leaping out of his seat. “I’ll get a doctor to come out to you.”

Kun watched him storming through the entrance doors and tightened his grip on the boy in his lap. He couldn’t shrug off the feeling that, somehow, it wasn’t over. It all seemed too easy, like they still had a few chapters left before the end of the book.

There was supposed to be a gang of psychopaths ready to take them out. Even if they had avoided them by taking the alternative route to the hospital, would they really give up that quickly? Weren’t they professionals? Wouldn’t they want to finish the job?

The back door was wrenched open and Kun barely stifled a yelp of terror, totally prepared to grab Chenle and run, but the arms that reached out to take the body from him were Peng Fei’s and the people behind him were dressed in pale blue scrubs.

No matter how much he didn’t want to, he relinquished his grip and allowed his kid to be lifted from his lap and transferred to the gurney that was waiting. As soon as they had him secured, the medics took off with a sense of urgency everybody seemed to share.

Kun tumbled out of the car and slammed the door behind him. Only now that he was standing did he realise how unsteady he was. He was surprised his knees had even allowed him to regain vertical status.

He stumbled and tripped after the doctors into the emergency department and was immediately accosted by the cacophony of noise that came with screaming feverish kids and patients howling in pain.

It was too much.

The hands that appeared on his shoulders were the only thing that kept him from crumpling like paper in the rain.

“Kun?” It was Peng Fei. It was always Peng Fei. It had always been Peng Fei since the start of this ordeal. “Kun, you okay?”

No, was the answer he wanted to give, but did he deserve to say so? When Chenle was in pain, suffering, missing a fucking ear of all things, could he really claim that he wasn’t a picture of health and happiness?

“He’s … His ear … They … Sepsis and …” He couldn’t get the words out. He didn’t know which argument he wanted to make first. “He’s just a little kid.”

“I know, Kun. I know. So what do you want to do now?”

He wanted to be with him, to hold his hand and whisper reassurances in the one ear he had left. But he was unconscious. Chances were he wouldn’t even hear him and he might just be getting in the way of the doctors and nurses who were saving his life. Plus, he wasn’t sure he would be able to stomach the sight of what those people had done.

“Kun.” He needed the shake to shock him back to reality. “You can fall apart later, okay? Right now, you need to decide if you’re going to go in there with him or if you’re going to stay out here.”

It shouldn’t really be an option, should it?

“Can you …” he croaked hoarsely. “Can you … Ten? Can you call Ten and tell him that …”

“I’ll take care of it,” Peng Fei agreed at once. “I’m gonna get some extra security to come watch over the hospital but I’ll be right here the entire time, okay?”

So he thought so, too. He knew there was something not right about how easily they’d brought Chenle back. They were never supposed to make it out of those woods so how come they were all still breathing?

But there would be time for that later. Peng Fei would protect them, just like he’d done since day one. Backup was arriving, too. There was no way anyone would be able to hurt Chenle again.

“Thank you,” Kun gasped out. “Just … thank you.”

He crashed through the resus room doors and immediately found Chenle.

He had all the appropriate monitors clipped to his fingers, squeezing his bicep and suckered to his bare chest. His ribs were more prominent than they had been before and every time he let in a shallow breath, the skin between them was drawn in just a little.

The screen beside the bed projected his vitals in an array of primary colours: pulse of 112bpm, respiratory rate of 24 breaths per minute, oxygen levels of 93%, blood pressure of 83/58. Kun wasn’t a doctor but he knew those readings said nothing good.

His head was turned to the side so the doctors could get access to the wound and a nurse was holding an oxygen mask to his face since they couldn’t wrap the elastic around his skull without disturbing the … _that._

Kun’s stomach flipped.

He didn’t want to describe what was on the side of Chenle’s head. It was bloody and grotesque and they were poking it with latex-clad fingers as if it was an artefact they were studying instead of the remnants of a child’s severed ear.

A constricted and muffled moan reached Kun through the wall of doctors and nurses and he saw a pale and sweaty hand spasming weakly towards the site of injury as though he was restraining himself from batting the professionals away.

He was awake.

“It’s okay, Chenle,” the nurse who was holding the mask over his nose and mouth called out. “We’re giving you something for the pain now, alright?”

Another nurse was already at his elbow, flushing saline through the catheter they’d driven into his skin and preparing the syringe of drugs. Chenle’s hand twitched again, fingers stretching out to grope at nothing.

Kun crossed the space between them in two strides and grabbed those fingers. He wrapped both hands around them and brought them to his chest. Chenle’s clouded eyes found him over the top of the mask and a tear slipped out to trickle over the bridge of his nose.

“I’ve got this,” Kun whispered to the nurse beside him, taking over the role of keeping-the-oxygen-mask-over-the-dying-child’s-face and allowing her to move away and do something a lot more productive. At least this way, he got to be closer to Chenle’s eyes.

They stared at each other without breaking the contact they’d craved for so long. Around him, Kun caught words such as “intravenous antibiotics”, “hypotension”, “insulin”, “corticosteroids”, “inflammation” and “sepsis” but he didn’t look away.

“You’re gonna be okay,” he whispered, stroking his thumb back and forth over the hand he was still clutching to his chest. “You’re gonna be just fine.”

Chenle blinked and another tear oozed out. Kun wished he could wipe it away but he only had two hands and they were both in use. The only thing he could do was keep caressing the boy’s knuckles and murmuring cliché comforts.

A nurse was hanging up an IV bag. A doctor was lowering the pointed tip of a syringe towards the patient’s wound.

“You’re gonna feel a couple of sharp scratches, okay, Chenle?” she said just before the needle speared the skin surrounding the bloodied mass. “It’s a local anaesthetic, alright? It’s gonna numb the area for a bit.”

It certainly didn’t seem like it. As soon as the metal point buried itself in his scalp, his entire body stiffened, his muscles locked and a strangled cry of pain crawled out from between his cracked lips.

The medics surrounding the bed immediately leapt forwards, holding his head steady and keeping his legs pinned down so that the doctor could finish administering the drugs and if Chenle had the strength, he would probably be fighting back.

But he just lay there, twitching weakly, and crying.

Kun crouched down beside his head so that the two of them were on the same eye level, and brought the kid’s hand to his lips. His knuckles tasted of dirt and blood and sweat but he kissed them anyway, over and over again. He gave Chenle a sensation to focus on that wasn’t people holding him down and a needle in his head.

“All done, Chenle,” the doctor praised in a condescending cooing tone as she returned the syringe to the cart beside her. “You should start feeling the effects any moment now.”

“What are you going to do?” Kun asked her softly, momentarily taking his eyes off Chenle’s face screwed up in discomfort.

“We need to debride the wound,” she relayed robotically, already dabbing at the area with a disinfected swab. “The necrotic tissue has to be removed before he starts the healing process.”

Kun didn’t know what that meant. “Debride” was a term he’d never heard before, but Chenle had stopped whimpering in pain even though there were hands all over the side of his face so at least the anaesthetic had started to work.

Then he saw the scalpel.

“Keep looking at me,” he pleaded, shuffling a little closer to the bed so that he was close enough to touch his forehead to Chenle’s. “It’s not going to hurt you, I promise. The hurting part is done. You don’t have to hurt ever again.”

Chenle had closed his eyes, probably to protect himself from having to see what Kun was seeing: a pair of bloodied hands cutting into his infected wound. Kun took a leaf out of his book and closed his eyes as well.

He felt the burn of the tears before he felt the wetness on his face but he didn’t fight it. He wasn’t sure he could’ve even if he’d wanted to. It was like somebody had flipped a switch and now he was full-on sobbing without the ability to stop.

It wasn’t fair. None of this was fair. Chenle wasn’t even an adult yet and now he was scarred for life, both physically and psychologically. He was never going to be able to move past this trauma and now Kun was going to push him back into the toxic arms of his toxic mother.

It wasn’t fair. 

He was still holding Chenle’s hand to his cheek and keeping their faces less than a centimetre apart. It was when he felt an index finger weakly traversing across his face, gathering all the tears it could reach despite how much pain its owner was in, that he felt the last pieces of his heart be reduced to ribbons.

Chenle was the one on this bed and Chenle was the one comforting _him._

“We’re gonna be okay,” Kun choked through the blockage in his throat, desperate to be the big brother he should’ve been from the start. “Both of us are gonna be okay. The doctors are helping you. You’re gonna be fine.”

Without taking his hand off the oxygen mask, he wiped his face on his sleeve and cleared his vision just enough to see Chenle’s pale lips moving through the sheet of plastic.

“What?” he murmured. “What are you trying to say?”

“This … same thing … did.”

“What?” Kun repeated, shuffling even closer and considering whether it would be possible to remove the mask for a split second so he could hear whatever it was. “I can’t hear you.”

Chenle gave a weak and airy cough before he tried again and, this time, Kun caught every word even over the sound of dead skin being scraped away from the tissue that could still be saved.

“This is the same thing those people did.”

At first, Kun didn’t understand. He repeated the statement in his head, trying to make sense of what it was supposed to mean. He glanced up at the doctor and the look of sheer concentration on her face as she picked at the infected scraps, and he made the connection.

The same thing those people did.

These doctors were doing the same thing those people did.

Pinning him down, holding him still, making it so that he couldn’t move or fight back while they took a scalpel to his skull and cut away at his skin while he writhed in pain and they ignored him.

It was the same scene. It was safer, more sterile, and this time it was intended to help him rather than hurt him, but it was still the same layout. He was reliving the torture and Kun was doing nothing to stop it.

It only made him cry harder.

“I’m sorry,” he sobbed into Chenle’s forehead. “I’m so sorry, Lele. I’m so sorry gege didn’t protect you.”

_I’m so sorry gege still can’t protect you, from this or from your mother. I’m sorry I sold you to her because I wasn’t competent enough to get you back by myself. I’m sorry I couldn’t keep the promises I made when I adopted you. I’m sorry I was too young to know how to take care of you. I’m sorry I made Yangyang take out the trash that night and I’m sorry I let you go with him. I’m sorry I took so long to save you. I’m sorry I wasn’t the gege you needed me to be. I’m sorry I failed you. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry._

He was going to have to tell Chenle what he’d done. Sooner or later, that bitch was going to show up and demand custody of her son. He wouldn’t be able to stop her. He’d signed off his rights.

When Chenle found out, he was going to hate him. This was the last time they were going to be brothers and they were spending it with Chenle drugged and Kun weeping like he was the one being picked apart by emergency room doctors.

He should say something meaningful and loving, reassure Chenle that no matter who had legal guardianship over him, he would always be his gege, but he could only think of one thing and he could only cry while he said it.

“I’m sorry. Gege’s sorry, Lele. Gege’s really sorry.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know this story has been almost entirely written from Kun and Chenle's perspectives but now that they're all back together, I promise I will be bringing in the rest of the members a lot more. The dreamies will get a moment, rest assured. Is there anything else you guys would like to see in the recovery process (besides Kun kicking the bitch's ass, because that will happen)?

**Author's Note:**

> Comments and reading what you guys think will happen/what you want to happen does wonders for my motivation so if you can spare a minute, let me know your predictions/things you want me to include.


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